Agarest Legacies
by Shadow's Forge
Summary: With the fall of Chaos, a world was reborn. A world of hope, a world with a future. Into this world was born Matthias Raglan, the latest in a line of heroes. Follow the life of the Sixth Generation in a world at peace. A peace that perhaps will not last...
1. Prologue: Chaos

_**AGAREST LEGACIES**_

**By Greg Wong**

* * *

**Prologue: Chaos**

* * *

Five blazing points flared against the darkness, and an outburst of light clashed against shadow even as energy exploded across the Boundary Plane. When the light faded and shadows had receded, a god fell to his knees.

Before Chaos, the god of Night, Death, and Rebirth, stood the array of mortals who had bested him. Human, syrium, onelthes, neocolom, ryulent, high elf, dark elf, greer, nelth, harpuia, yulishee and demigod.

Leonhardt Raglan, Fyuria, Elaine, Luana.

Ladius Raglan, Valeria, Sherufanir, Yayoi.

Thoma Raglan, Lavinia, Faina, Noah.

Duran Raglan, Hildegard, Silvi, Ryuryu.

Zerva. Vira-Lorr. Winfield. Arbol. Sharona. Ganz. Plum. Alberti. Qua. Fer. Reverie. Beatrice. Murmina. Vashtor. Borgnine.

Ellis and Dyshana.

And Rex Raglan, the culmination of a mighty bloodline that spanned five generations, the beacon of hope for a world that stood on the brink of utter ruin.

It was this last that the defeated god looked upon.

"This world you wish to bring about, a world without gods, will not come easily. There will be suffering in the transition. Many will not thank you for what you have done today."

The youngest Raglan shook his head. "And I'm prepared to accept that. This world is false, one doomed to collapse. And when that occurs, what happens after?"

Ellis, the high elf woman who had stood witnessed the Raglans' sojourn from its beginning, stepped forward to stand next to Rex. "Beyond that suffering is the world we seek. One with a future, one with hope. A false world does not have those."

Chaos just gazed down upon the pair, deep in thought. His gaze shifted to a tall, pale-haired woman standing silently behind Rex.

"And you, my other half, will you govern this new world?"

Dyshana shook her head. "Not govern, no. No one human can govern a world. But I can help nurture it. Guide it."

A chuckle came from the god. "You have performed your function beyond admirably, Dyshana. You have not just brought about this world's rebirth, but its redemption as well. These mortals will prosper without the watch of the gods. They will be the perfect caretakers." A small smile crossed Chaos' face, bringing some kindness to his harsh visage. "And it seems that you are no longer just my avatar. You have become your own person, and have gained a heart along the way."

A smile the closely resembled Chaos' crossed Dyshana's lips. "It is so."

With another chuckle Chaos rose to his feet with sudden swiftness, injury and weakness apparently forgotten. For a panicked moment weapons rose to point at the god even as a shock of fear ran though their wielders.

They had banished five gods back to the void before him. First Mercury, the remorseful god of smithing who had been interred in Lucrellia. Mobius, the scheming, heartless god of time and space, in Graccea. Next, Deeth, the whimsical trickster goddess of fate, in Fendias. Then Nemesis, the serene goddess of stars and vengeance, in Enhambre. And, finally, the wrathful god of war and flame, Mayastia, in Aegisthus.

They had all paled in comparison to Chaos, whose power eclipsed theirs by an order of magnitude. Several times the companions had despaired that they could not overcome this last foe. It was only after the Raglans had unleashed the impossible powers within themselves had they been able to force Chaos to his knees.

They had just given all they had, only for Chaos to rise, unmarred by any injury. He raised a hand in placation, a smile again returning to his lips.

"Peace, mortals. I have no desire to fight you any longer. I just wish to impart some knowledge before I depart this plane.

"Remember that this world is now in your hands. Good hearts will nurture it, while evil ones will attempt to destroy. It is for you to decide which one will triumph.

"And yet, do not fear the night. Remember that light and dark are an inseparable pair. Light will shine brightest in the dark, and it will creates shadows even as it pushes back the darkness. Remember that endless day is just as unbearable as endless night.

"And do not fear the death and the thereafter. Life and death are fundamentally linked, and, just as with darkness and light, you cannot have one without the other. Endless life has no meaning just as lifeless death is meaningless.

"So do not fear death and darkness. And yet, do not let evil run free. I am a god of night and death, not one of evil."

With a respectful nod to his vanquishers, Chaos gestured with his hand. Light sparked in a luminescent circle around the god, signaling that his departure was near.

"It is time, my children" Chaos said.

Footsteps came as Leonhardt and the others of past generations walked towards Chaos. Tearful goodbyes were exchanged by friends—and progeny, in Rex's case—before they moved towards the light.

Particularly heart wrenching was Borgnine, the steadfast guardian of Ellis, when he revealed that he, too, had to depart this world.

"Do not cry, master," the larva said in a soothing voice that would have been alien to him at the time of his summoning. "I will always be with you, in your heart. And you will be within mine. It is this heart that you have given me that I must share with my people."

With a final embrace the guardian left the master and joined the others.

Light flared around Chaos, and suddenly, he, along with Leo, Borgnine, and the others, were gone from this plane.

The world shuddered as the change came. The spires that had held the continents together collapsed, and with them the land itself was sundered.

But Chaos had one last gift for the world. Exerting his waning influence over Agarest, he eased the transition, soothing the violence of the upheaval as the earth began to settle into its new foundation. He was assisted in no small part by Borgnine, who, free of the restraints of this plane, was able to extend his own incredible power over the world.

Ultimately, there were deaths across the world, but a mere pittance to what could have been if Chaos had not aided during the passage.

For even the night could be kind, and even darkness could show compassion.


	2. Chapter 1: Aegisthus

_**AGAREST LEGACIES**_

**By Greg Wong**

* * *

**Act I**

* * *

**Chapter 1: Aegisthus**

* * *

Rex yawned, sitting up in bed.

Or, well, tried to. It was probably rude to do that with a sleeping woman splayed out on top of you. Unfortunately, the yawn seemed to do the trick, and Ellis mumbled something into his chest before raising her head to look at him sleepily.

"Is it time?" his wife asked, not quite stifling a yawn of her own.

He turned his head towards the window. The curtains were muting the sunlight streaming into the room, but even then, it didn't look bright enough yet.

"I don't think so. Still a bit early. You can go back to sleep if you want."

"That doesn't sound bad, actually," the high elf said as she laid her head on the adjacent pillow. She snuggled up closer to him.

Um...

Ellis' eyes popped open as she discovered it. Without a word she lifted the sheets, peered down, then returned to look at him. She cocked an eyebrow as she said, "You said it was early."

He shrugged weakly. "Well, you know, it's sometimes like that in the morning," he said stiffly, clearing his throat. "It, uh, can't be helped."

"Oh, I don't know about that," Ellis said to him, a sly smile on her face. She wiggled closer, covering his upper body with hers.

Any sleepiness he might have had was now irrevocably, impossibly, irredeemably gone. Having Ellis wriggling on top of him had a tendency to do that. And not just Ellis. _Naked_ Ellis. Making love and then falling fast asleep the previous night without bothering to retrieve one's nightclothes had a tendency to do that, too.

Ellis' lips covered his in a slow, passionate kiss. He wrapped his arms around his wife, drawing her closer.

His wife broke away a little, giggling. One hand reached up to cup his cheek while the other traced itself across his chest, moving lower, over his stomach.

Oh, this wouldn't do. With a smile he moved one of his arms, fingers gliding down Ellis' spine, moving lower, towards her rump. He let his hand rest there for a moment as Ellis practically quivered in anticipation. And that's when—

Someone knocked on the door.

Oh, gods above...

His hand—and Ellis' too, sadly—froze as he and his wife looked towards the door. Maybe if they didn't say anything, the person on the other side would think they were still asleep and would leave.

"Sir Davien and the escort are here!" piped a voice from behind the door. "And the wagons, too! And someone from the ship! And lady who I think wants to sell some sheep. Oh! Sir Davien said that because he's so early that he doesn't mind waiting until you're properly ready. What should I tell them?"

Before answering, he carefully lifted the sheets and looked down. He sighed. The mood had been irrevocably, impossibly, irredeemably killed.

Ellis giggled again she she rolled off, allowing him to sit up in the bed.

"Tell Sir Davien that I'll be out shortly. Please have Bertram serve them some refreshments if they want anything."

"Okay!" There was the sound of receding footsteps as their little interrupter dashed off.

He sighed again.

"Oh, don't worry, Rex," his wife said to him. "We'll make some time later. You'll think of something."

"I suppose," he replied, grinning. "But why the pressure on _me_? You can think of something clever yourself, you know."

Ellis sat up, her back to him, silent.

"I remember when I proposed to you I begged you to go easy on me," he said with an exaggerated sigh.

"I also remember telling you 'not a chance,' " his wife said, looking over her shoulder and winking mischievously.

Then and there, he was monumentally tempted to push Ellis back down onto the bed, and damn Davien and the other waiting knights.

He was actually shifting his weight when pattering footsteps returned to outside their door.

"Oh! Sorry! Um! I almost forgot! Good morning, Mother! Good morning, Father!"

He and Ellis stared at each other for a few heartbeats, blinking. Then they burst out laughing.

"Good morning, Matthias!" he and Ellis said in unison.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, Ellis, groomed and dressed in sensible traveling clothes, along with Rex, went outside to meet Davien.

"Good morning, Count Roaring Cove, Countess Roaring Cove," the knight said as he drew up to them, giving them a small bow.

She chuckled. "Sir Davien, how many more times do I have to insist on _not_ using our titles?"

Davien replied with a laugh of his own. "Only when it ceases to be amusing, Milady."

Beside her, Rex smiled and extended a hand. "It's good to see you, Davien. How goes it, my friend?"

"As well as could be, Milord," the knight replied, shaking Rex's hand. Normally shaking a hand with a mere knight was beneath a count, but Rex never seemed to care about things like status. It was just one of the many reasons why she loved him. "Centan is still beautiful, the sun still shines, and my sister gave birth a week ago to a healthy baby boy."

Oh, Kirsten had given birth already? "That's magnificent! Tell her congratulations from us," she said.

Davien nodded in thanks. "I will gladly do so, Milady. It would please her to hear it."

They made small talk for a few minutes, catching up.

Davien was a few years younger than Rex was, but taller and broader, especially in armor. The knight had been a boy during the war against the darkness nine years ago, and had, just like the whole world, witnessed the final battle with Chaos. Davien had deeply admired Rex ever since, and that admiration had grown up to a good friendship between the two. And while he was a little over ten years older than Matthias, the young knight provided a much needed big brother to their son.

She excused herself as Rex and Davien began to talk business, namely the move and the overseas escort. She had better find Matthias to make sure he was ready to go in a couple of hours.

Chaos had been right, to an extent. There had been no shortage of people who had cursed the Raglan name because of the upheaval. Countless people had died and livelihoods had been thrown into chaos when the land had been torn asunder. The deaths and ruined lives had rested heavily on Rex and her for several years. The birth of Matthias had been a welcomed bright spot, and raising the energetic young boy had been a much needed distraction, but sometimes at night, when they were alone, they couldn't help but think about it.

Two years after Matthias was born—three years since the fall of Chaos—the ruler of Centan had invited them to the capital. She had been reluctant to go, what with infant son and all, and Rex had volunteered to go by himself. She couldn't even consider letting her husband brave the people alone, though, so she accompanied him.

At Centam, in a quiet but public ceremony, the king had awarded the title of count to Rex and countess to her. But that hadn't been the eye-opener. It was the crowd, thousands strong, who cheered and chanted the Raglan name.

But it wasn't until the carriage ride to their new home, the small County of Roaring Cove, that it truly hit them. The road they had traveled had been lined with wheat fields, with fieldworkers frantically working to complete the harvest before the frost set in. The upheaval had devastated many farmlands, and while there was no famine, food was still very expensive.

But even as they worked, the fieldhands rose from their task to wave at the carriage cheerily before returning to their work, despite the daunting winter.

When they had arrived at their new estate—a small, simple thing, which fit them perfectly—Rex had wept.

"This is what we fought for, Ellis," he had said to her. "We fought for that hope, for a free land. This is what Leo, Ladius, Thoma, Duran, and thousands of others _died_ for."

Another seven years passed, and it was one hundred and one years to the day when Leonhardt had become the first Spirit Vessel to save her life. And now they would be soon leaving the county and the beautiful, cacophonous cove that was its namesake. It was not large loss, if you looked at it financially. Roaring Cove was a county in name only, and was in reality just a few hectares of land with a nice house by the shores of northern Aegisthus. Their titles, themselves, were also honorary. But it was home, and for Matthias, the place where he had been raised. It would be hard to say goodbye.

But they were going to. Two years ago Rex had received a letter from Zerva, who had moved back to Lucrellia not long after Chaos had fallen. Zerva still had visited from time to time, to visit his great-great-great-grandnephew—and great-great-grandnephew, naturally—but recent correspondence from Zerva revealed that he was now the chief of Bright Woods Village, near the Frontier area in Lucrellia. He was too busy to come visit, as was Vira-Lorr, who had often accompanied the syrium on his visits and had apparently been inducted into the community over there. But that wasn't much of a surprise.

The real shock had been the Zerva's revelation that a coalition of several kingdoms—from all five continents, at that—had organized, financed, and crewed a project to erect a series of monuments in honor of the fallen Raglans. The four monuments would be placed in Lucrellia, Leonhardt's homeland, near the location where he had accepted his contract to become a Spirit Vessel. Architects, smiths, stonemasons, and engravers from all over the world had been hired for the project, including her old friends Ganz and Plum. The way Zerva told it, the two of them had refused payment for the project, but had finally relented and promised the rewards to their hometowns. It would be nice to see them again.

In the end, they were invited to move to Lucrellia for the dedication of the monuments, which was now only about six months away. She had wondered if Rex would be reluctant to leave their comfortable life in Aegisthus, but her husband had expressed a desire to see Leo's—and her—homeland. Several meetings and letters and months later, here they were, ready to leave. A home was waiting for them in Bright Woods.

Now only if she could find their son...

She circled the estate, looking for Matthias. Not in the yard area, or the stables. He couldn't have gotten into the field, could he? She had told him not to run off today. Hands on her hips, she started walking along the western wall of the house.

"Matthias!" she called. "Matty!"

Nothing

Gah.

None of the Raglans—save Thoma, when he was doing his double act with Winfield—were ever this much trouble! Granted, she had had the party to help her with raising Thoma, and Ladius, and Duran, and Rex, but goodness. Matthias was honestly something else entirely.

Of course, she wouldn't trade him for the world.

"Lady Ellis?" she heard a voice call from behind her. She recognized Bertram's voice, and turned. The servant walked up to her swiftly. "Are you looking for Master Matthias?"

"I am," she said, fighting the desire to sigh. "Do you know where he's gotten off to?"

"Well, no I haven't, Milady." Bertram bent closer to whisper into her ear conspiratorially. "However, I do believe I heard some odd noises in the bushes behind the barn. And there might have been a boy who made an old man swear not to tell his mother where he is." The servant straightened up. "Perhaps I could take a closer look again?"

She laughed at that. Oh, Matthias.

"No, no, that won't be necessary, Bertram. I suppose I'll find him sooner or later. However, if you could, please help supervise the movers inside the house. Make sure they don't take anything that belongs to you, for example."

The servant smiled warmly. "Of course, Lady Ellis. I'll get right on that. Have a good day then." Her servant gave a small bow and started to make his way towards the house.

Ellis watched the older man go, smiling. Bertram was nearing sixty, and while in fine health for his age, she had noticed he was starting to move a little more stiffly than she remembered. She and Rex liked Bertram a lot, and Matthias treated the old servant as favorite uncle, despite Bertram's status as a servitor. After discussing it, they had consulted a judge concerning the transfer of the land, and had eventually been able to sign over the deed to the older man. Not the noble title of course, since it was hereditary. However, according to the contract, one month after their departure, this area of land would not longer be the County of Roaring Cove, but simply the estate of Bertram. The old man had been good to them over the years. He deserved a nice, quiet place to retire to.

Speaking of nice, it would be _nice_ if she could find her little rascal of a son. She approached the barn as quietly as she could. Decades of traipsing through forests, deserts, wetlands, and caves helped her with that. Goodness. To think that all might have been a waste.

She heard definite rustling coming from behind the barn. With a quick step she rounded the corner and...

And was treated to the sight of an nine-year-old—almost ten—boy scrabbling underneath a bush. Her son was so engrossed in... whatever he was doing that the boy hadn't noticed her arrival. She darted her hand in—again, reflexes gained from defending yourself against orcs and goblins that wanted to eat you were helpful—and closed her thumb and index finger on her son's ear. Not hard, mind you; for all his energetic adventurousness and disregard for time, Matty was a good-natured and—generally—obedient boy. Still.

There was a yelp from within the bush.

"Matthias Raglan," she said, slowly, deliberately, and firmly. This was, incidentally, the voice she had used most often with a younger Thoma back in the day. "When I release your ear, you are crawling out of that bush, understood?"

"Yes, Mother," she heard Matty squeak.

She let go, and her son scrambled out from under the bush.

And there, for all the world to see, stained in sap, covered in dirt, and with at least a half-dozen six-legged things crawling over him, was Matthias Raglan.

Matty was large for his age and the physique strongly reminded her of the tall, broad-shouldered Ladius. In terms of features, however, the boy strongly favored her husband, except for hints of herself in his eyes and, of all things, ears. Matthias looked to have have ears a little longer and pointer than the human norm. It would be hard to tell, since her son was so young, just how large they would grow. Ladius had been half syrium, and Duran had been a mixture of over half syrium, high elf, and dark elf, but both of them had had human ears.

Oh, what was she thinking about? She was supposed to be scolding the boy.

Almost without thinking, she flicked her hand up and tousled the boy's hair, which was a rather striking mixture of Rex's pale brown highlighted with her pink. A couple of rubs, and the hair—cut short to vainly prevent this—disgorged the foliage and dirt that had taken up residence there. Something green with wings buzzed away angrily.

"Matty, didn't I tell you to be ready and presentable by now?" she asked, amused.

Her son blinked. "Um. Yes? I was going to be dressed and prepared, honest, but then I forgot about that I'd been planning with the flicker beetles."

She frowned. "Flicker beetles?"

"Yes. You know how I capture them in jars sometimes and use them as lights inside the house at night when I don't have a candle and we really shouldn't use candles anyway?" Matty said in one breath. "Well I thought that would go double when we're on a ship, so I was collecting some more bottles of flicker beetles for the trip.

She sighed. Oh, well, a bottle of luminescent beetles couldn't hurt anyone, could they? She gestured to the corked bottle of insects at her son's feet.

"Oh, all right then. Bring the bottle aboard the ship. But next time, _remember_ when we have to stick to a schedule, all right? Being on time is important. Beetles aren't."

"Okay. I'm sorry, Mother." Matthias looked down at the ground.

A more cynical parent would assume that the remorse was manufactured, but she knew her son. Behind that energy and curiosity—and, yes, a regretful lack of respects for schedules—was a genuinely good child. She was proud of the son she and Rex were raising, even if the boy drove her batty on occasion.

She wouldn't trade it for the world.

She felt a sudden surge of love for the boy, bending down and giving him a kiss on his forehead. Matty looked slightly embarrassed at receiving a peck from his mother. After all, what if Bertram or, gods forbid, Sir Davien were somehow watching.

She chuckled and tousled Matthias' hair again. "Okay, off you go to get cleaned up," she said.

Her son picked up the bottle of beetles, and started to trot off to the house.

Wait a moment.

"Matty!" she called.

Her son turned. "Yes, Mother?"

"You do know we'll be at sea for a total of three or four months. Do you have food for your little friends?"

Matthias' face brightened. "Oh, yeah, I thought ahead about that! I have some food packed away for them!"

"Oh, good, then." Wait. Something was still making her motherly senses tingle. "How much?"

"Um... something like eight or nine pounds? Around that."

Wait, what? Nine pounds of insect feed? "Matthias, they can't possibly eat that much!" she exclaimed, looking at the jar with no more than a dozen of the little beetles.

"Well, not just this bottle, of course," her son said, as if that explained everything.

She was starting to develop a sinking feeling, one that was only slightly less intense than the ones she had felt when Winfield would try to sneak an eyeful at the baths.

"Matthias, how many bottles of flicker beetles do you have?"

"Including this one? Twenty-seven."

Her first, blaring instinct was to yell no, no, no, twenty-seven bottles of bugs were _not_ coming aboard the ship. Then her second instinct, the one where she didn't feel she had the heart to shatter her son's dreams of a room full of buggy companions, superseded the first.

She scratched at her temple. "O-okay. Um, just get cleaned and dressed for the journey. It's about forty minutes by carriage to the dock, so make sure you're comfortable and clean. I'll talk to your father about the beetles."

"Okay!"

Her son charged off towards the house to hopefully get clean, and she had the dubious task of figuring out what to do with twenty-seven jars of insects. Well. She supposed she could make Rex make all the decisions regarding that. After all, she never promised to go easy on him.

She grinned to herself.

Wouldn't trade this for the world.

* * *

In the end, she and Rex decided Matty was allowed to keep fifteen jars. But only five pounds of bug food, gods above.

* * *

"Well, I suppose this is goodbye, Master Matthias," Matthias heard Bertram say to him.

"I guess so," he said, looking down at the ground and kicking a pebble.

"Normally you look at someone in the eye when you prepare to take your leave," Bertram said in that real nice, patient voice he always used.

He looked up at Bertram... only for the servant to get all blurry and his eyes to get all tingly and watery and stuff. He was crying. That was bad. Very Bad. Sir Davien had always said tears should only be shed for a dead ruler or comrade. Bertram was kind of a comrade. But he wasn't dead. Just going away.

He leaned forward and gave Bertram a tight hug.

"There, there, Master Matthias. You'll know where to find me. Visit me when you can, yes?"

"Yeah," he said, sniffling. Sniffling as also a Bad Thing. Had to stop. Stop!

"I left an extra bottle of flicker beetles by your bedroom door," he said, fighting back the sniffles. "In case it's dark in there."

He felt Bertram pat his head.

"Thank you, young Master. I'll make sure to use them well."

"And sorry about that thing with the vase and the strawberries and the caterpillars," he added.

He heard the old man bawl out with laughter. "Hah! Think nothing of it. And if it makes a difference, I laughed myself sick once I managed to clean it up."

"Okay," he sniffled. "Bye, Bertram."

"Farewell, Master Matthias."

He let go of Bertram, and he was finally able to rub his nose. Had to make sure Mother didn't see him. She didn't like it when he wiped his nose with his sleeve. He retreated to the waiting carriage, hopping in even though a footman offered to help him up. He watched Mother and Father also say their goodbyes and give Bertram a hug. He saw that both Mother and Father had a little moisture in their eyes. Hmm. Since Father probably the coolest thing to ever walk Agarest, maybe crying was only Bad, not Very Bad.

Mother came inside next, and just like he had, she hopped up without help from the footman. Mother always did things like that, and he was pretty sure she didn't notice it. Like Bertram might accidentally nudge something over, and Mother would catch it before it fell. Or when taking a walk she would skip over a pothole or large rock without seeming to notice it. He'd also seen Mother doing magic sometimes, too, and not just the healing water or light magic when he scraped himself. Sometimes when she didn't know he was watching her she would do this complex spell that looked like a huge lightning bolt. Or a blinding flash. Or swords made of light. Hmm. Maybe Mother was cool in her own way, too.

Father came in last, and the footman shut the door behind him. The carriage started moving.

He leaned towards the window and gave Bertram one last wave. The servant waved back.

And then they turned a bend, and the house was gone.

He continued looking out the window and saw Sir Davien pull up alongside the carriage. The knight gave him a nod and a little salute. Smiling a little, he returned the gesture. He saw Sir Davien give another nod and trot his horse past the carriage.

"He's cool," he said to himself quietly.

"He is," he heard Father say. Ah! He'd been too loud!

"I'll agree with the sentiment," Mother added. Then, "Although, I still can't figure out where that term came from, you know. Generally when something's cold, that's not a positive statement. Well, unless you're describing ice cream." Pause. "But the flipside to saying that about ice cream is that it's just like saying water is wet or fire is hot. A bit redundant."

He shrugged and made a "I don't know!" noise. "The other kids in Centan started to use it, at least that's what Sir Davien said."

His father leaned towards. "Wait, you mean to say Sir Davien uses that slang, too?"

"Mm-hmm. I heard it from him first. He just doesn't do it when he's being formal or doing knight stuff."

"Huh," he heard Father say. "You know, I'm barely six years older than Sir Davien, and I never caught on to the 'cools' and 'awesomes' and whatever. Am I just out of touch?"

"Well, sweetheart," Mother said to Father, "it's worse for me. For over a hundred years I traveled five different continents, meeting all kinds of different people and hearing all manners of speech. You'd think that I would be able to at least _understand_ this new Aegisthusian slang, even if I didn't adopt it. But it confuses me like nothing else."

"Eh, out of touch," he said faintly.

All talk stopped. Slowly, he turned away from the window to look at Mother and Father who were staring at him. He'd be worried that he might be in trouble, except he could see twitching at the corners of their lips that said they were trying not to smile.

"Um... only slightly?"

Mother and Father broke out laughing.

* * *

"Odd name for the ship," Rex said to no one in particular as the carriage pulled up near the pier.

"What is?" Matty said, clambering over to look out the window. "E-T-S _Hildegard_," his son read.

He waited. Shortly, he was treated to the sight of something clicking inside his son's head.

"Wait, isn't that Grandmother's name?"

"Yes, yes it is," he said offhandedly, thinking. "It's not exactly a common name around here, so I wonder..."

Eh, he'd find out soon enough.

The carriage stopped and the footman opened the door. He reached a hand up to help, only for Matthias to barrel through the door and hop to the ground with an almost perfect landing.

The amused footman offered a hand to him, but he declined it with a thankful nod. He stuck the landing only slightly better than Matty had. Well. He had the excuse that he didn't travel by carriage much. This was his... third time? Yes, third.

But anyway, time to help the lady wife. He turned, offering a hand—

To nothing as Ellis stepped lightly off the coach's frame to land gracefully on her feet. Perfect landing. Raising an eyebrow, he extended his elbow it out to Ellis. With a teasing smile his wife slipped a hand into the crook of his arm, and together they made their way to the dock and the five people waiting patiently. Sir Davien and the two other escorting knights had also dismounted and were trailing behind them with their luggage.

"By the way, sweetheart," he said to Ellis out of the corner of his mouth, "at least let me _try_ to help you out of the carriage next time. You made me and the footman look bad."

"Oh, I can make a two foot jump like that perfectly fine, you silly man," Ellis said back to him airily.

"Well, yes. But it's the principle of the matter. I'm the husband. You're the wife. The husband helps the wife."

"Well, I suppose. I was going to say that I was handily dodging orcs, gurgs, garvels, and giant zombie dragons before you were born, but then I realized you could reply with how you beat a god senseless with a sword made of light. So by my decree you are allowed to help up or down from quote-unquote _high_ places next time."

"My, my, how gracious of you, Countess Roaring Cove," he said, giving Ellis a playful nudge in her ribs with his elbow. She squawked at the poke, but wasn't able to retaliate because they were close enough that the waiting ship's crew could see any retaliation she tried to level at him. His wife had to settle with briefly sticking her tongue out at him.

He stepped forward and offered his hand to the one standing out in front, a tall, athletic woman with red hair and deeply tanned skin. Wait, not tanned skin. He could see her ears sticking out to the sides from beneath her cap. A dark elf. Interesting. Dark elves weren't normally known as a seafaring people.

The dark elf's grip was dry and firm. The woman also shook hands with Ellis, interestingly enough.

"Good afternoon, Count Roaring Cove, Countess, Master Matthias," the woman said, addressing all three of them. "My name is Yshae, the captain of Enhambre Transoceanic Ship _Hildegard_. With me are my boatswain, Buckland," she indicated a heavyset, grizzled man who somehow didn't look sloppy in his uniform, which seemed to be cream-colored, loose-fitting pants, a black boots, a white shirt, and a gold-trimmed red jacket with a strange insiginia on the left breast. The bosun extended a hand to him, and he took it. Slightly damp, but also a firm grip. Buckland didn't offer to shake Ellis' hand, but gave a respectful bow.

"Here we have Midshipmen Samuel and Harper," Yshae continued, indicating two small figures flanking the captain. The two boys couldn't have been more than twelve, if that. Samuel was the larger of the two, with a bright grin and friendly brown eyes that matched his hair. Harper was noticeably smaller, with intelligent green eyes, freckles, and what looked to be messy blond hair. The two cadets shook his hand, and Ellis'. Interestingly, Harper also shook Matty's hand, much to his son's puzzlement.

"That is it for my officers and senior staff," Yshae said. The dark elf turned to the last person, a slim, middle-aged man with a hawkish nose and short blond hair. "And now, I suppose, a word from our sponsor."

The man stepped forward. He was wearing a uniform jacket just like the ship's crew, but without the patches and rank insignias.

"Hello. I'm the president of Enhambre Transoceanic. It's a pleasure to meet you."

Enhambre, hmm? Made sense. The island nation had an extensive maritime history, so he had made sure to have the person planning his travel arrangements chartered a ship from there. He hadn't expected some kind of group or company, though.

Something was odd, too. The man had given his position, but not his name. And he seemed content with stroking the one decoration on his dress jacket, an insignia that looked like a skull and cross—

"Wait a moment!" Ellis suddenly exclaimed beside him. "It can't be! _Kilik_?"

"Yes it is indeed, Miss Ellis," the man—Kilik, apparently—said. "Was wondering if you were going to remember me."

"Well, of course I would remember you," his wife said. "I just wasn't expecting," Ellis indicated the ship and the crew, "this."

Kilik nodded in understanding.

He was having trouble placing this man. He didn't know any Kilik. Ellis obviously did, and she had most likely met him in Enhambre. But he couldn't remember.

Wait, hold a moment. He looked again to the ship. _Hildegard_. His mother had been, before meeting his father Duran, the head captain of a small pirate flotilla. The Death Cross pirates, if he remembered right. So what was this man doing with a ship named _Hildegard_, though? He obviously wasn't a pirate. And Kilik, Kilik... Now that he thought about it, the name was actually familiar to him. He thought about some of the stories Ellis had told him about his father's forays in Enhambre. One of them had involved a coup by one of Hildegard's crew, a man named Vlady. Leading a countercoup had been...

A man named Kilik.

Ah.

He noticed everyone had stopped talking.

Kilik grinned. "You remember me? Or at least, the stories about me, Mister Rex?"

He nodded. "Yes. Just barely remembered stories that my wife told me when I was younger, I'm afraid."

The president nodded. "Fair enough. That being said, I'm sure Miss Ellis is still confused why I'm addressed as 'president' and not 'pirate king' or something."

"Yes, that did cross my mind," his wife said with a grin.

Kilik nodded. "To be honest, Hildegard was never truly comfortable with piracy. Oh, she knew how it was done, and she could do it just fine, but deep down she was hoping for something different. Something better."

He suddenly remembered Chaos' words.

"After the... sealing, or whatever it was, I was left in command of the Death Cross pirates. Because of the coup, those who had vehemently opposed Hildegard's ideals were dead or dispersed. So I pretty much found myself with a like-minded, highly-skilled crew.

"So we started changing up a bit. Instead of piracy, we started hiring out as protective escorts for merchant ships. Since we had been good pirates, we made good _anti_-pirates, if you get my drift. Eventually, business started to dry up on that front and we started doing mercantile jobs. Removed some of the cannons to increase cargo space, things like that. And with our skill and experience, we were very popular with clients."

"Sometime later we were approached by Beatrice and her flotilla of ocean-crossing ships. We signed on as mercenaries with the group, and, if I can proudly say, did what we could to help defeat Chaos' armies.

"Eventually, you took down Chaos, the world was reborn... and the oceans were now open to ships even without special artifacts or powers or whatever. To make a long story short, a few business deals here, a few purchases there, and Enhambre Transoceanic was born. We're only about twenty ships strong right now, but we're also the most experienced group out there. We're establishing trade routes, trading partners, the works. Well." Kilik shrugged. "My co-owners are really the ones doing the hard work. I never had a mind for complex business dealing like that. I just make sure we have the right men in the right place, and make sure they stay motivated. Hence why I'm here and not stuffed in an office. I'm nonessential."

He heard Yshae chuckle. "With all due respect sir, I'll insist that you're at least semi-essential."

Kilik laughed. "Damn with faint praise, why don't you?" The president shook his head. "That's the story in a nutshell. If you would like to come aboard and get settled, we could discuss more when we get under way. High tide is in two hours."

Yshae snapped her fingers. "All right! Mister Buckland, get some men to get the Count's and Countess' luggage up for them!"

"Luggage detail, aye, Ma'am!"

His son stepped forward, eyes wide.

"Wait! Tell them to be super careful with the bottles!"

* * *

The ship was big. And since he had never been on a ship before—rowboats didn't count—this was a cool new experience. Mother and Father were talking with Kilik and Yshae in one of the cabins, while Sir Davien was with the other knights getting settled into their rooms, which left him alone. Well, at least he had time to explore.

Matthias wandered around the deck, making sure to stay out of the sailors' ways. There was a lot of loading going on, with the sailors going up and down the gangplank and winching stuff up onto the deck.

He made his way to the rear of the ship, and saw Boatswain Buckland and Midshipman Samuel on a raised portion at the back of the ship. Buckland was watching the sailors moving around on the deck, sometimes shouting commands at them—and sometimes words his mother probably wouldn't want him to repeat—while Samuel was scanning the skies with a spyglass. He climbed the stairs up to them.

"Uh, good afternoon, Boatswain Buckland, Midshipman Samuel," he said formally. He wasn't sure how to address them, honestly, so he just copied the words Captain Yshae had addressed them with. Mother had said ships were very strict, so he was going to be super polite.

"Good afternoon, Master Raglan," the boatswain rumbled to him. "And, if you would, 'Bosun' works just fine when addressing me."

"Okay, Bosun, um, sir."

"I'm no officer, Master Raglan, so a 'sir' isn't needed. But thank you, though."

"Okay, Bosun."

Buckland chuckled.

Next to him Samuel lowered the spyglass, shaded his eyes with a hand, then looked through the spyglass again.

"Bosun, I think I see her. Mile or so out, but coming fast."

Her? Her who?

"Good eye, Mister Samuel. If I could make a suggestion, I think it'd be best to inform the captain."

"Of course. I'll do that."

"Very good, sir."

He scratched his head at how Buckland was talking to Samuel formally. Wasn't Buckland like the boss, or something? Hmm.

Samuel started moving down the stairs, disappearing into a door beneath where they stood.

"Bosun, could I ask a question?"

"Go right ahead, Master Raglan."

"Why do you address Midshipman Samuel as sir? And why, uh, suggest stuff to him instead of ordering him like the other sailors?"

"Ah. Well, you see, Master Raglan, Midshipman Samuel—and Midshipman Harper, of course—are officer cadets. Midshipmen rank higher than me, so we refer to them as Midshipman, or Mister, or Sir. Or Miss or Ma'am." Buckland had added the last part after a few moments.

"Oh, I see. Thanks."

"Of course, Master Raglan."

"Oh, one more thing. Who was, uh, Mister Samuel looking for?"

"One of our last two passengers, Master Raglan."

* * *

Matthias talked with the bosun for a couple of minutes more. During that time a harpuia had landed, and not long after a man on a horse had also arrived at the pier.

Captain Yshae and the two midshipman came out from the aft cabin area—Buckland had told him a little about the areas of the ship—and made their way down the gangplank. He rushed over to the other side of the poop deck and watched the captain greet the two last passengers.

One of the newcomers was a girl with black wings and blue hair. He couldn't tell how old she was. He did see that she was wearing form-fitting breeches with a white sleeveless tunic, and had a holstered pistol strapped to her thigh. The only luggage she had was a satchel and a small pack slung across her back.

The other was a large man. The captain was a slightly shorter then Father. The man—who had long red hair and very pale skin that contrasted with his black clothing and cloak—was nearly two heads taller than Captain Yshae. Wow! That meant he was even bigger than Sir Davien, and Sir Davien was the biggest man he knew. The sword that the pale man carried in a baldric had to be massive, as well. The man had some bags lashed to his horse, which some sailors released and carried into the ship.

The five of them made their way down the pier and towards the ship. The door beneath the poop deck opened again and Mother, Father, and Kilik appeared, walking towards the quarterdeck.

He a gave a wave to Buckland and ran down the stairs to catch up with Mother and Father.

Mother turned just as he got to them.

"How was the ship, Matty?" Mother asked him.

"It was cool," he replied. "So much stuff to look at. Buckland—uh, I mean, the _bosun—_is going to show some more stuff about sailing later, if he has the time."

"Just be careful. A ship's very dangerous."

"I _know_, Mother. I'm not, like, going to jumped on top of the rails or anything."

Mother just chuckled, reaching out a hand to stroke his hair. Urg. Embarrassing!

"Not just falling overboard. Rigging and ropes can be dangerous. The yards and spars on the masts can hurt you, too. And hatches opening if you're not careful. That kind of thing."

Whoa. The ship was _dangerous_. It was like ten times more interesting now.

Wait, hold on. His eyes widened. His mother was using words like the ones Bosun Buckland had.

Mother grinned at him. "I sailed on a ship with your grandmother for a couple of weeks," she explained to him. "I'm no expert, but I remember her telling me to always be careful. I suppose I'll have to teach your father about how walls are called bulkheads and so on."

"Okay," he said, still amazed his mother knew this kind of stuff. He was classifying the bosun as being pretty cool, so hearing Mother talk so knowledgeably about her ship made her _cooler_.

Whoa.

During this the captain, the midshipmen, the harpuia—who didn't look any older than Father—and the pale man appeared on the deck. He wondered how they would react to—

"Murmina, Vashtor, it's good to see you again," Father said to them with a wide smile.

Wait, what? He was still trying to wrap his brain around that when the harpuia lady rushed forward and gave Father a tight hug. He noticed that the lady's face lit up when she hugged father, as well. She was a little pretty, but the harpuia had sad, golden eyes. When she had seen Father and Mother, her eyes had lit up and her lips had widened into a dazzling smile. She was suddenly very pretty.

The harpuia lady hugged mother as well, just as tight. Then she came to him.

He suddenly felt very shy.

"Hello," the lady said to him in a slow, quiet voice. "Matthias, is it? I'm Murmina, an old friend of your mother and father."

He wasn't sure how to respond. He thought about something Sir Davien and Father had always said, though, that, if you were unsure how to address a person, politeness was never bad.

"Yes, my name is Matthias," he said carefully, extending his hand. "Pleased to meet you, Miss Murmina."

Murmina looked surprised, but she shook his hand. He made extra sure to also follow what Father and Sir Davien had said, that handshakes should always be firm and not like a dead fish. He always wondered what a dead fish handshake would be like, though, since they had fins and no hands.

The harpuia stepped away, giving room for the huge man—Vashtor, right?—to extend an arm to father. To his surprise, Father and the pale man didn't shake hands normally, but instead grasped each other's forearms and shook like that instead. Vashtor didn't shake hands with mother or hug her, but gave her a deep bow. Then, of course, Vashtor came to him, hand also extended.

After thinking about it for a second, Matthias reached out his hand, shaking Vashtor's like his father had, hand to forearm. This time it was Vashtor's turn to looks surprised. The pale man looked at father, who just smiled. He noticed that Vashtor's eyes were strange. They were black instead of white, with golden irises.

"I have to say, I wasn't expecting either of you," Father said to them.

"We have free time," Murmina said. "With Uttara Kulu finally rebuilt and garrisoned, some of the pressure was finally taken off of us."

"Murmina and I are what's called vanguard scouts," Vashtor explained. "Basically we're an independent roaming group that patrols portions of Aegisthus that aren't covered by main forts. Added with the regular harpuia patrols that come out of Uttara Kulu, most of the continent is considered secure."

"And there's not many demonic forces anymore, what with Summerill banished," said Murmina. "Honestly, the last time we've seen an actual orc or goblin, and not just a roaming pack of werewolves or warlocks, it was half a year ago. There was about a half dozen of them terrorizing a small settlement a little west of Limburg."

"It didn't end well for them," Vashtor added.

Well, that was it. Vashtor was confirmed cool.

"Anyway, around that time we received some letters from Zerva about the monuments in Lucrellia. With the continent as protected as it can be, I requested some extended leave time for the two of us. The commanders allowed it, we chartered a ship, and here we are."

"Coincidence?" he heard his father ask, turning to Kilik.

The president shrugged, smiling widely. "Possibly."

"That's good, then," he heard Mother say. "Glad to have you with us."

"Likewise," Vashtor replied.

"And now that the reunion is over, I think it's almost time for us to depart," cut in Kilik. "High tide is just about to set in, and I think Captain Yshae would like to get under way as soon as possible."

"Quite right, sir." The captain turned down to look at him. "And if the Count and Countess do not mind, Master Raglan is allowed to observe from the poop deck if he wishes. A certain bosun told me he was curious about the operation of a ship."

Oh, nice! He looked expectantly at Mother and Father. Father just smiled, but Mother looked a little unsure.

"I don't know. Are you sure he won't be in the way?"

"Not in the least. Midshipman Harper, please accompany Master Raglan and answer his questions. And, of course, make sure he's not in the way."

"Accompany Master Raglan, aye, Captain," the blond said.

Cool!

* * *

"Ah, what a day," Rex said as she sat down heavily on the cot next to his wife.

"It's been tiring," Ellis agreed. "But it's nice to see some familiar faces again."

"Yeah. It was good to see those two again. Murmina and Vashtor look good."

"Mm-hmm."

The _Hildegard_ had weighed anchor and was traveling along the coast, heading west towards Enhambre. Up till now Matty had been able to explore the ship with Harper, and, eventually, Samuel. He hoped Matthias wouldn't get bored, since the sea journey was going to be very long, but, knowing how creative his son was, he wasn't too worried about that.

Speaking of Matthias, he hadn't seen a sign of the boy since the midshipmen had whisked him away.

Hmm.

"Also nice to see Matthias having fun and being... occupied so deeply," he chanced.

He knew Ellis was tired, but how tired? Maybe...

"It is. I'm just worried about when he runs out of things to poke at."

Darn. Either Ellis hadn't gotten the hint, or she _really_ was too tired.

"Oh, I don't know about that," he said, keeping any trace of disappointment out of his voice. "Bored is one thing I don't think Matty could ever be."

He looked down at the floor as he said that. Oh well. They had plenty of time ahead of—

He heard Ellis giggle.

Blinking, he looked at his wife.

Grinning, Ellis scooted close to him, moving her face close to his.

"Rex Raglan, you just simply aren't the subtle type, are you?"

He put on a sheepish grin. "It was that obvious?"

"More than obvious."

"Eh, maybe I just need practice?"

"Maybe I'll just have to drill it into you," his wife said with an impish grin.

"Sounds like it could be difficult. Then again, I doubt that's going to change anything. After all, like you always love to point, you're not inclined to go easy on me."

"Oh, no indeed."

With another giggle, Ellis pushed him down onto the bed.


	3. Chapter 2: Enhambre

_**AGAREST LEGACIES**_

**By Greg Wong**

* * *

**Chapter 2: Enhambre**

* * *

"Ugh. I think I'm going to die," Ellis heard Rex moan miserably.

"Oh, please. Seasickness just builds character," she said affectionately, stroking her husband's hair. In her other hand she had conjured a small ball of light to illuminate their room. There were no windows, so magic was their only source of light.

Hmm. Maybe she'd ask their son if she could borrow a jar or two of the beetles.

"I'll trade character for not dying," Rex groaned.

After a peaceful—and very satisfying—night, she'd awoken to to the sound of her husband retching forcefully into a pail that was apparently in the room for just that purpose. She'd tried to use her healing magic to soothe Rex's stomach, but it had had absolutely no effect. She remembered something similar had happened back in Enhambre when they had been sailing in one of Hildegard's ships._ That _time it had been Winfield,Vira-Lorr, Ganz, and Sharona who had been laid up with upset stomachs. That time her healing magic—as well as the spells from Plum and Reverie—hadn't mattered to their stomachs one whit, either. When she'd explained that magic wasn't going to solve the problem, Vira-Lorr had declared that her future sight had returned and that she foresaw her own demise from seasickness.

She smiled at the thought as she sat by Rex, watching his breathing. After a few moments her husband rolled onto his back and looked at her.

"Well, I think it's improved a little. I don't feel the need to... to... _hurk_."

She shifted out of the way as Rex lunged for the pail and threw up into it again.

"Okay, I lied," her husband gasped. "Talking. Bad."

She didn't reply to that, just shifted hands to massage Rex's neck and shoulders. Her husband sighed in appreciation, closing his eyes. She snuffed out her illumination spell, and a few moments later she heard Rex lightly snoring. Good, he'd managed to get to sleep again.

She laid her cheek against Rex's foreheard. Sweaty, but normal temperature as far as she could tell. Just plain old seasickness, which would be overcome eventually. She gave her husband a light kiss on his forehead and quietly left the room. After a second thought she went back inside to grab a light cloak.

She made her way towards the upper deck, passing Matthias, Harper, and Samuel in one of the passageways. Matty was enthusiastically explaining to the two officer cadets a method to weaponize a type of hairy caterpillar using fruits and a jar. The two midshipmen were either genuinely interested or were excellent actors.

Oh, gods, what had she unleashed on this poor ship?

Snorting, she emerged topside. It was only a few hours after dawn, and the breeze made it chilly. Thanks goodness she'd thought to bring a cloak. She walked along the port side of the deck until she caught sight of Murmina leaning on the rails near the forecastle. She made her way to the younger woman. Murmina had her own cloak wrapped around her, a harpuia-tailored one that left her wings free.

"Murmina! How are you—"

She stopped when Murmina turned to her. The harpuia looked absolutely dreadful. Murmina's face was haggard, there were dark bags under her eyes, and, unless Ellis' eyes were playing tricks on her, the other woman's cheeks had a greenish tinge to them.

Oh, dear.

"Murmina? I think you should lie down."

"Tried that," Murmina said in that quiet, unhurried voice she was used to. "Didn't help." The harpuia leaned down, closed her eyes, and took a few deep breaths. Amazingly enough, Murmina's color improved a bit. "The fresh air is actually helping. I just feel terrible, not like I'm going to die." Murmina paused. "Vashtor suggested it."

She blinked when she heard that. Unless she'd misheard that, Murmina had just said she and Vashtor were rooming together.

Of course, she wasn't going to draw attention to it.

"I think I'll try that with Rex, then," she said. "He's not feeling well, either. Maybe after he wakes up."

Oh, she was just too curious about this, but how to go about it? Hmm... Ah.

"Speaking of Vashtor, where is he?"

"He's at the other end of the ship, speaking with your knight escorts that you came with. Davien and the others."

She nodded. "I see. I have a feeling that they'll get along well." The tall, broad-shouldered, black-haired Davien with his sharp blue eyes developing a friendship with the stoic gurg would make an interesting sight.

"Better than me and Vashtor, you mean?" Murmina asked, turned to look at her with a slight smile.

Here eyes widened in response. "Was I that obvious?"

The harpuia shook her head. "No, not really. It's just..." Murmina shrugged, ruffling her feathers. "Well, seemed like a good segue. I've wanted to talk to someone about it, you especially."

"Me?" she asked, puzzled.

"Well, aside from Zerva, Vira-Lorr, and Winfield, you've known him the longest. And he didn't kidnap any of the other three for a month."

She nodded in understanding. "There's that, I guess. What did you want to talk about?"

Murmina didn't say anything. Then, "You know, now that I brought it up, I have no idea."

She couldn't say that she understood, not honestly. It wasn't her family that Vashtor and his forces had wiped out. But she could easily see that Murmina desperately did want to talk about this, but didn't know how. Murmina had never been an emotional one. Whether she had always been like that or if the attack had changed her was anyone's guess, but it didn't change the fact that Murmina didn't know how to go about this.

Ellis had raised four generations of Raglans. She'd like to think she knew how to get people to talk.

"Well, I notice he's not dead," she said to the harpuia.

Murmina was silent for a while. "After that battle in Dandalugan, Rex's words didn't really register for me. The _only_ reason I didn't put a bullet in Vashtor's skull was because was adamant in standing between me and him."

"But later?"

"Later, I had time to think, and Rex's words were true. At least, that's how I saw them. If I did give into my hatred and kill him in cold blood—he was already defeated, with no hope to win against Rex and the others—what was going to happen? I guess there could have been a chance that my hate would have just faded away. But I don't think so. I think it would've just simmered in my heart until I found something else to hate, and the cycle would continue."

"And you'd just tell yourself it a was revenge you lived for, not hate," she said.

"Yes, exactly. I'd just convince myself that I was doing this for my fallen comrades, when in reality I'd just be doing it for myself." She saw Murmina straighten up, still staring at the ocean. "Don't get me wrong. I'm a harpuia, and we're no strangers to war. If a dangerous enemy threatens us and our allies, we'll put it down. Hard. If Rex hadn't been strong enough to best Vashtor, I'd have looked for every opportunity to put a slug into heart. But Rex was strong enough, and Vashtor was helpless. Anything beyond that wouldn't be defense against a deadly foe. It'd just be cold-blooded slaughter.

"I'll admit, for a long while I wasn't convinced of Vashtor's sincerity about repenting. I just saw the monster that had destroyed Uttara Kulu, and the only possible explanation for his begging forgiveness was to save his own hide. Maybe buy enough time to betray you again and kill you later on."

"But you saw how he fought when he was beside us," she said to Murmina. "If he had really only been thinking of himself, or if he had been less than sincere about trying to make amends for what he'd done, he wouldn't have fought as hard as he had against Summerill or the dark gods."

Murmina nodded. "That was part of it. But it wasn't just how determined he fought. It was his..." She saw the younger woman frown, as if she couldn't find the right words. "I was going to say 'his heart,' but you can't see that, not really. But I guess you can get clues. Hints. I could see it in the set of his body, in his eyes, on his face. There was no malice in in him. No hate. Yes, he could be completely ruthless. We all saw how merciless he was whenever we fought against the other dark knights, or the garvels, or whatever other creature that attacked us. It just... duty, I guess. Determination." The harpuia paused. "Sincerity."

She didn't say anything, just waited for Murmina to continue.

"If I could have seen evil and hate in Vashtor, maybe I could have convinced myself to continue hating him. But he had none of that inside him. No hatred. No malice. Ruthlessness, yes. Fierce anger, yes. Raw aggression, yes? But evil? Not really. Not even if I tried to convince myself otherwise. And that got me thinking, if this person that I hated so much didn't harbor the same hatred, where did that leave me? I wasn't hating to counterbalance Vashtor's hate. I'd just be hating for the sake of it, and that would only make me an ugly, hollow person on the inside."

"You mentioned Vashtor's sense of duty," she said to the other woman after a bit. "You know the kind of influence Summerill held over the gurgs, yes?"

Murmina nodded. "Yes, but even Summerill's will wasn't that strong. He couldn't have somehow controlled Vashtor to do what he did. Not with the willpower Vashtor has. Vashtor would have had to _willingly_ do what he did, including leading the attack on Uttara Kulu. But you're right. Sumerill did have a lot of influence on him. It's just that it was less some kind of mind control and more along the lines of Vashtor having pledged loyalty to Summerill, and he wasn't the person to break an oath."

She hadn't known that. Well, the part about how seriously Vashtor would take an oath was well known to her. In a roundabout way, it would explain his betrayal; he wasn't double-crossing them, but rather he was just staying true to his original pledge to Summerill. The part, however, of Vashtor not being coerced mentally, was new to her. She had assumed Summerill or Chaos had warped Vashtor's mind so badly that he had been literally forced to do their bidding.

"That I found out much later, though," Murmina continued, "when I asked Vashtor about it directly."

"How long have you two..." she asked, trailing off. "Been together" just sounded obtuse, somehow. How could she put it...?

"Been together?" Murmina said. Heh, of course. "Pretty much ever since Chaos fell. The two of us helped the other harpuia rebuild Uttara Kulu. In his case, literally, with his own two hands. I guess being able to lift three times more than the strongest harpuia helped with that. But when the commanders decided he was more useful for more than manual labor, were assigned together as vanguard scouts to the outlying areas in Aegisthus.

"The nature of the job meant we spent of lot of time together. You know us, though. Neither of us is the talkative type, especially with what we had between us. But, at least in his case, I learned more from how he acted than how he spoke or what he said. How he fought, how he interacted with townspeople, with the harpuia, that all told me volumes more about him as a person than anything he could have possibly said."

Murmina suddenly chuckled to herself.

"Still though, I still considered myself his... I don't know, which leash handler. His watcher. I even told him, on several occasions, that the moment he went back down the path of evil I would hunt him down, put my pistol into his mouth, and pull the trigger. And every time I said that, he would just nod at me in acknowledgment. At first I thought he didn't care, or that he was underestimating me. It took me a while to realize it: if Vashtor ever did go back to darkness, I wouldn't need to shoot him. He'd pull the trigger _himself_."

Now _that_ was telling of Vashtor's character. There were times, in her darker thoughts, when she wondered how far she could trust the gurg, especially now that she had a son. But now, if _Murmina_ could say these things about him, she really had nothing to fear.

"So I guess the final question is what we are to each other. We're comrades, yes. He's entrusted his life in my hands when we skirmished against the monsters, knowing full well that I didn't have any obligation to keep him alive. I've also placed my life in his hands, even though there was a chance he could let me die, leaving him free of me. But we've been through more than any other set of teammates could say they have.

"Friends... maybe. I had friends back in Uttara Kulu, and I didn't know them a quarter as well as I know Vashtor now. We're... closer than that, I think. So, in the end, what does it make the two us? I honestly don't know. More than comrades-in-arms. More than friends. What comes after that?" Murmina shrugged. "We're certainly not like you and Rex." Murmina continued in a perfect deadpan. "Speaking of which, I think Vashtor and I are in the room adjacent to yours...and the walls aren't soundproofed.

What did soundproofing have to do... with...

Oh, gods.

She felt heat rush into her cheeks.

"Oh. Er. Well. Uh. Sorry?"

"Oh, don't be," Murmina said with a rare laugh. "I was took sick to fall asleep, anyway, and your husband's still as handsome as ever."

She laughed as well though her cheeks still felt like they were on fire. "I won't disagree with you there."

Still grinning, Murmina said, "So, yes. More than comrades. More than friends. Not quite lovers."

"Yet," she interjected, taking a retaliatory poke back at Murmina.

This time Murmina flushed red a little, which actually made her look worlds healthier. "Yet," the harpuia conceded reluctantly. "Don't expect anything like that soon, if ever. There's still too much of a... wall between us. I'll never, not even in a thousand years, forget the sight of him as he and his goblins and garvels came over the walls to destroy my home. Killing my friends and comrades." Murmina shook her head. "But I can forgive him." The harpuia turned her head to look at her, and she saw a faint sheen in the other woman's eyes. "_Have_ forgiven him. I guess only time will tell what comes next."

She moved a little close to Murmina and laid a comforting hand on her shoulder. "That's how it usually is. Rex gave us that opportunity."

"And that's something else I owe your husband for," the harpuia said softly. The younger woman smiled again. "Thank you so much for listening, Ellis."

She returned a smile of her own. "Thank you so much for sharing."

* * *

"So... what are these again?" Matthias heard Samuel ask him.

"Flicker beetles. They're bugs that light up. Watch." He tapped the bottle a few times, and the flicker beetles flashed. The light faded in and out, of course, but it was just enough light to see by.

"So... why bring them?"

"Well, Harper told me that fire is real dangerous to a ship, so bringing a torch down into the 'bilge' area would probably be super dangerous, so I brought these guys instead."

"That actually kind of makes sense," Harper said.

He and the two midshipman had spent the morning looking around the ship. Well, they were giving him the tour. They probably knew this ship inside and out. But still, it was cool to have someone to explore with. Afterward, Harper said he'd show him how they took windspeed measurements and how the rigging worked.

But first, the bilge.

They given him a short explanation. It was the bottom o the ship, which was below the waterline. It was probably going to be wet down there. That didn't make since too much. If the inside of the ship was wet—with water—wasn't that, like a sign that the ship was sinking?

Well, he'd find out.

They tiptoed through the door—hatch—and walked down a short flight of iron steps into the bilge area. He held up his bottle of beetles and saw that the midshipmen had been lying. It wasn't wet.

It was _flooded_.

"Um," he said eyes wide. "Isn't that bad?"

"Nah, that's normal," Harper answered. "It's below the waterline, so water leaks in sometimes." The bosun had explained to him yesterday that a ship's hull was sealed with tar or pitch. Guess tar and pitch wasn't perfect for keeping the water out.

The blond cadet pointed to a couple of thin pipes to led up into the deck above. "Those lead up to the bilge pumps. When the water level is high, some sailors work the pumps above and suck the water out and back into the ocean.

"Oh, that's kind of cool," he said, moving the jar a bit so he could see the pipes better.

"Cool?" he heard Samuel say. Well, yeah, we're in the part of the ship that's all dark and damp. Of course it's going to be cold in here."

Oh, man, no one understood him! "I meant... never mind. I'll tell you later."

He took a step down, wanting to get a closer look.

"Wait, don't," he heard Harper hiss as the blond grabbed him. "It's slippery and—"

It was slippery. Yeah. With a yelp, he and Harper tumbled down into the water. It was only like half a foot deep, but gah! It was only half a foot deep... but the water felt oily, smelled terrible, and tasted worse. He was still gagging on the gunk when he heard Bosun Buckland's voice coming from the hatch.

"Mister Samuel!"

They all froze as the bosun took a few steps down into the bilge.

"Ah, good morning, sir."

"Uh... good morning, Bosun."

"Good thing I found you, sir," Buckland said. He noticed the Bosun was entirely focused on Samuel and hadn't take a glance at him or Harper. "The captain is addressing some correspondence and requested some assistance. She asked if one of the midshipmen would be available for help, sir."

"Oh. Um. I'll be right on my way, Bosun. Thanks for telling me."

"Of course, sir. By the way, sir, have you by any chance seen Master Raglan or Midshipman Harper anywhere above deck, have you?"

There was literally no way the bosun hadn't seen them. So...

"Er... no, Bosun, I haven't seen Master Raglan or Midshipman Harper above decks."

"Well, I suppose I'll have to continue looking for them then. Although, I must say, if Master Raglan or Miss Harper were to be... frolicking in the bilge area and soaked in bilge water, it might be prudent for them to get cleaned up in my quarters, since it's nearby and empty, and has a spare set of clothing on the off-chance that midshipmen might get their uniform wet. All speaking hypothetically, of course, Mister Samuel."

Oh. He got it.

"Right, hypothetically, Bosun," Samuel said. "I'd, uh, better attend to Captain Yshae. Um. Master Raglan and Midshipman Harper were exploring the ship. They might be nearby your quarters in, er, ten minutes, maybe."

"Excellent suggestion, sir. I'll check there a couple of minutes. By your leave, sir?"

"Yes, Bosun. Please carry on."

Buckland climbed the stairs out of the bilge, with Samuel right behind. And, hey, they didn't close the door.

He looked back at Harper, who, like him, was completely drenched in really icky water. They stared at each other for a few seconds, then burst out laughing.

Yes, the Bosun was _definitely_ a cool guy.

Still laughing enough that his side hurt, he fished his jar of beetles out of the water—good thing it floated—and started to climb the stairs out of the bilge, a giggling Harper right behind him. Hopefully he could get dry before Mother and Father—

Waaaaait a second.

Blinking, he looked back at Harper.

"You're a _girl_?"

Harper stuck her tongue out at him.

* * *

Okay, Matthias had decided. Even if Sir Davien had told him that all women were delicate flowers who deserved nothing but respect from a man. Even if Father had said the same thing. Even if he loved Mother and would never, ever do anything to be mean to her.

But no, girls were evil.

He and Harper had gotten into the bosun's room without anyone noticing. Inside were two towels, two washcloths, and a small bucket of clean water. The midshipman went through a small chest at the foot of the small bed and came out with two sets of clean clothing.

He was reaching for a towel and cloth—he guessed that the water was for them to sponge themselves off—when the girl slapped his hand away.

"What?" he yelped.

"Me first," the blonde said.

"But..."

"I'm the officer. I go first." Harper looked up, like she was thinking for a moment. Then, "Also, because I'm a girl. You also have to face the wall."

He started to protest again, but then he realized it. Girls were evil. Grumbling, he crossed his arms to try to keep himself warm and faced the door while Harper cleaned up.

Evil, evil, evil.

"All right, your turn," Harper said to him after a few minutes. He turned, and the midshipman tossed a clean washcloth into his face. Harper snickered.

Evil!

He started to strip off his shirt, then remembered. "Hey, _you_ turn around now."

Harper chuffed, but spun around, her back to him.

He scrubbed himself down with the washcloth and the water, keeping a close eye on the girl in case she tried to do something dumb like turn around or throw something at him or whatever. Thankfully, Harper didn't, so he was able to get himself cleaned—kind of; the bilge water totally sucked—quickly. The clothing was the thick pants—dungarees—that the sailors wore and a white cotton shirt. A little big, too. Maybe they were spares for Samuel?

Oh, boy, how was Mother going to react to this? Maybe he could say some rats of improbable size had eaten his shirt. Or something. That sounded dumb.

"Okay, I'm done," he told Harper. "So, uh, what now?"

The girl turned, shrugging. "I guess we wait outside until the bosun 'finds' us."

"Makes sense," he said, looking sidelong at Harper. Looking at the midshipman now, especially when she didn't have her hat on, he wondered how he didn't figure out she was a girl. She was smaller than Samuel, for one thing, and her lips were maybe a little... puffier. Longer eyelashes. Harper's hair, though, wasn't girly at all. It was all clumpy and messy, and he'd guess it was like that under her hat even when she hadn't been doused in bilge water.

Humph. Harper was still evil.

* * *

Rex shielded his eyes against the setting sun as he finally caught sight of land.

Twelve days had passed since their departure from Aegisthus, and they had reached Enhambre. Kilik had explained that they were here for a brief hull inspection of the _Hildegard_ and to pick up some "auxiliary personnel," whatever that entailed. There were also another pair of ships—smaller, one-hundred-fifty-foot sloops as opposed to the two-hundredy-twenty-five foot galleon _Hildegard—_the _Star Of Nillea_ and _Fortuitous __Winds._ Together, the three ships would be exporting materials to the other continents on the way to their destination, Fendias, Graccea, and finally, Lucrellia.

He couldn't wait to dock, honestly. He'd managed to get his stomach in order after the first day, but... ugh. He supposed he wasn't cut out for sea life. The constant rocking of the boat as it crested the waves was driving him insane. To be fair, though, the fresh sea breeze was refreshing, but he had had that back on the cliffs of Roaring Cove, where the ground stayed properly still. He stepped back from the rails.

Uff.

He dodged cleanly out of the way as Matty, Harper—whom Matthias had unenthusiastically revealed was a girl, to his and Ellis' amusement—and Samuel made their way past, obviously on some mission or another. The two older kids seemed to have adopted Matty as their official mascot, which he was happy for. Their son hadn't grown up with kids his age around, with the closest thing to a playmate being Sir Davien, who was twenty-two to Matthias' nine.

The crew of the _Hildegard_ also seemed to like his son. They had especially taken an interest in the jars of beetles, which were hung up in netted bags in the interior passages to provide safe light within the wooden ship. Kilik had even expressed interest in the possibility of doing the same thing to the other ships, in lieu of more dangerous torches or lanterns.

About that time Matty had launched into an enthusiastic explanation of how long the beetles lasted, the best jars for them, and the ideal leaves to feed them to make them glow brightest. To his credit, Kilik had seemed genuinely interested about the whole thing.

"Count Roaring Cove?" a voice asked from behind him.

He turned. It was Yshae's steward. "Yes..." he blanked on the name. What was it, what was it? Oh. "Seafurt?"

"Sir, the Captain wishes to inform you that dinner will be ready in fifteen minutes, in her stateroom. Would you like me to find and inform the countess?"

He shook his head. "No, don't worry about that. I'll find my wife myself, thank you. Although, if you could, if you see my son you could tell him I do expect him there, clean and on time."

A smile tugged at the steward's lips. "I will do that, sir."

With a nod, the crewman departed.

With one last look look at approaching Enhambre, he went to look for Ellis.

* * *

Rex hadn't had to worry about his son, in all honesty, both for being on time for dinner and about the trip in general. Both Buckland and Yshae had told him Matthias was practically bugging the crew about the workings of a ship. He was frankly surprised how complex sailing was, since, as far as he could tell, Matty hadn't run out of things to learn yet. Showed how little he knew about traveling across the oceans.

The midshipmen had even gotten Matthias into fishing yesterday. The ship sometimes used it to supplement their supplies but Matty had wanted to try for the fun of it. The captain had seen no problem with it, so Harper and Samuel had abducted Matthias—or maybe it was the other way around?—and rigged the fishing equipment. It wasn't simple fishing rods, either. The poles were as wide as three of his fingers and taller than he was. The fishing line was more like a cord, and the hooks were only slightly thinner than his pinky. After baiting them with some salted beef, the poles had been swung out to trail behind the ship and placed into thick brackets.

He and Ellis had watched for a bit, mostly to make sure nothing amiss happened, and partly to see how Matty enjoy the experience. They hadn't needed to worry; the two midshipmen seemed to know exactly how to get everything set up, with the help of a couple of sailors. Matty had watched expectantly off to the side for a few minutes.

He'd laughed to himself at that. He'd taken his son fishing by a small inlet near the cove once. Matthias had quickly grown bored with tortuous task of waiting for a fish to bite and had wandered off into the forest to poke at insect nests and climb trees.

So he hadn't been surprised when Matthias lost interest with the fishing poles and started looking for something else to occupy him. That's when Midshipman Harper had started up a long lecture on the different kinds of fish that were in this part of the ocean, the best methods for catching them, and how best to cook or preserve. Matthias had clamped onto that, and he had been personally amazed about how much Harper knew about fishing.

About fifteen minutes later there'd been a tug on the line.

After a few moments, he'd seen that the three kids wouldn't be able to land it. He'd quickly ran towards the three of them, leaving his laughing wife behind. It took about ten minutes and the help of another sailor, but they had managed to land the fish, a massive, hundred-pound tuna that was bigger than Matthias was.

His son had stared at the wriggling monstrosity, wide-eyed, even as some more sailors had appeared to haul it down to the galley. Midshipman Harper had been looking at it hungrily.

Two guesses what they were having for dinner tonight.

So here they were, seated at a large table in Captain Yshae's cabin, waiting for dinner. The two midshipman had actually managed to get Matthias here only a few minutes after he and Ellis had arrived, and reasonably groomed, too. Along with his family, the two midshipmen, Kilik, Murmina, and Vashtor were also present. It had been a challenge to get Vashtor's huge frame seated properly, but they'd managed. Davien had been invited, but the knight had declined.

A moment later the captain entered, and as was apparently the custom, they all rose until Yshae had seated herself.

And then the steward served... tuna. Tuna steaks, tuna fillets, and a tuna salad made from flaked fish and some of the rare fresh vegetables the ship had stored. It was actually quite good, and Ellis even asked how what the recipes were. His wife and Bertram had split the cooking evenly back in Roaring Cove.

They initially talked about business and schedule. Kilik explained that the journey from Enhambre to Fendias would be significantly longer than the trip from Aegisthus to Enhambre, so the ship would be in port for a few days as supplies were purchased and loaded. The sailors were even going to be given a couple days of leave before the ship set sail. However, they were going to release anchor tonight, outside the bay, before entering the port at Nillea early in the morning when the tide rolled in.

While talking, he noticed that Harper hadn't said a word, but was quietly devouring her food. The girl was being polite, not shoveling it down, but Harper was clearly enjoying the fish.

"Is tuna your favorite, Midshipman Harper?" he asked.

Harper looked up quickly from her plate, eyes wide in surprise.

"No rank in the mess, Rex," Yshae said to him smiling.

He cocked his head at that, question in his eyes.

"Basically, dinner is an informal time, and we don't use our ranks," Kilik explained. "So here, I'm just Kilik, she's just Yshae, and they're Samuel and Harper."

"Although," he heard the captain add, "with that said, it's usually respectful to append 'sir,' or 'ma'am' to your seniors." Yshae had said that while looking at Samuel.

"Right, ma'am," the boy said with a smile.

"Well, it wouldn't matter one way or the other to me, at least," his wife said. "To be honest, being called 'Countess Roaring Cove' was always a bit weird for me. A simple 'Ellis' was always more than enough for me."

He nodded. "Same as my wife. I've always ever been known as Rex. No more, no less."

"I don't think I've ever heard anyone ever call me mistress of ma'am before," Murmina muttered, scratching her hair. "If anyone did I'd be honestly shocked."

"But the crew _does_ address you as 'Dame Murmina' or 'Sir Vashtor,' don't they?" Yshae asked, suddenly serious.

"Well at first, they did, yes. I eventually convinced them just 'Miss' would be fine. I'm not a knight."

"And neither am I," Vashtor finished.

"Hmm," Yshae said, leaning back in her chair. "You could have fooled me, Vashtor. But, technically you _are_ both knights. I know a little bit about how things work in Uttara Kulu, and a vanguard scout is equivalent to a lower tier Aegisthusian knight, more or less."

He saw Murmina shrug. "Whatever the case is, it still feels odd."

"Still..." Yshae said.

"Just for a quick explanation," Kilik said, "it's not that we're trying to make the crew make you feel self-conscious or uncomfortable. It's a matter of discipline and respect. Ships at sea are dangerous places to work in, and every crewman has to listen to his bosuns, officers, and captains. Lack of respect for superiors can literally destroy a ship."

He understood exactly what Yshae was talking about. During the final days of the war, he'd been in close contact with—and sometimes commanding—contingents of Aeisthusian troops. During a battle, soldier couldn't hesitate, or second-guess his commanding officers. Doing so could lead to his death, the deaths of his comrades, and in extreme cases, the loss of the engagement. There was a reason discipline was so tight in armies, and, it looked like, on ships as well.

"But going back to the original question," Yshae said, shifting the conversion quite well, if he had to say so himself, "Harper here grew up around fish."

"Yes, sir," Harper said as he turned back to look at the girl. "I grew up in a fishing village on an isle south of the Enhambre archipelago. Our village was good at what we did, so were never hungry, and we sometimes caught enough extra to trade with the other islands or the mainland. So I grew up learning about fish, fishing, and everything else related to them."

He gave a little laugh at the little blonde's explanation. "Well, I guess it's the taste of home, then," he said. "Although, if I were you, and grew up around fish, I'd probably have grown tired of them by your age."

"Well, maybe, sir, but I mostly get that from my mother. You see—"

"Belay that, Harper!" Yshae snapped, leaning forward on the table. Harper went silent.

All conversation stopped. He—and everyone else—stared at the dark elf. What had he said to get that reaction?

"Yshae, please," Kilik said after a few tense moments. "This is Rex Raglan we're talking about. Look at his wife. His child. His companions." Kilik gestured to Ellis, Matthias, Murmina, and Vashtor in turn. "Hell, even his lineage."

And that just confused him even more.

With a loud sigh, the captain leaned back, rubbing her temples, eyes closed. "You're right, Kilik. I wasn't thinking. It's just that..." Yshae shook her head. The captain opened her eyes and said to Harper, "Continue."

Harper blinked, looking back between him and the captain. "Um, aye, ma'am." The girl focused on him. "Well, sir, the reason I like fish so much is that I'm half cat."

Wait, what? He stole a quick glance at his wife, who looked just as confused. Harper must have seen the confusion on his face, because the girl's eyes widened in understanding.

"Oh, sorry, sir. I mean I'm half cat. Cat neocolom."

And now he went from confused to completely surprised.

"Don't sorry, sir, it surprises a lot of people, too, since I don't have, um, a tail or cat ears, but..." He watched as Harper opened her mouth and pointed. Now that the girl drew attention to it, he could see that her canines were noticeably longer than a normal humans. "Also," Harper continued after closing her mouth, "some people say my eyes light up a bit when it's dark and I face firelight at a certain angle."

Now that was something he hadn't expected. He'd guessed Harper's gender a few hours after meeting the midshipman—he and Ellis were still amused with how that had escaped Matthias' notice for so long—but being neocolom would never have have crossed his mind. He regarded the girl a little more carefully. Maybe it was just him imagining things, but it also seemed that the pupils in Harper's bright green eyes seemed a little more oval than a human's, too.

"Please, forgive me for the outburst," the captain said. "It was out of line."

"But I think I know why," he heard his wife say from beside him.

Ellis was alluding the to Yshae's obvious dark elf heritage. He'd never seen it firsthand, but both Ellis and Vashtor had told of him the prejudice—and sometimes outright hatred—dark elves face all over the various continents. His grandmother, Lavinia, who had only been half dark elf, had faced that discrimination in her own city.

Neocolom were generally accepted, but that feeling wasn't universal, and bigotry against them turned up here and there. He remembered a few inns that had refused renting a room to Qua, all those years back, for no other reason that she had large ears and a puffy tail. If Harper could pass off as a human girl, the captain had probably thought it would be best for her welfare.

The captain just shook her head.

"That's right," Harper continued. "Everyone in my village was kind, but some of the other villages and the towns on the mainland didn't like my mother, or my father for marrying her."

And that sobered up the mood, if it wasn't already before.

He glanced at his son, who was looking, wide-eyed, at Harper. He didn't know what Matthias was thinking. The revelation of Harper's gender had thrown Matty for a loop for a bit, but he'd recovered from that. He didn't know how his son was going to react to this latest news.

Matthias opened his mouth to speak. He almost spoke up himself, worrying that Matthias would say something that was going to ruin the great friendship he had established with the two midshipmen.

A touch on his arm. He closed his mouth, turning slightly to look at Ellis. His wife shook her head slowly, all the while smiling in that loving, tender way she did whenever she was musing about their son.

He turned back to face Harper. Matty had just finished asking something about Harper's eyes. The girl just nodded, and he caught a look of apprehension on the midshipman's face. She, too, seemed worried about what Matthias would think, if Matthias was going to reject their friendship because she was half neocolom.

He smiled to himself. Of course Ellis was right. Why did he even worry? He knew his Matthias, the son he and Ellis had raised.

"Okay, cool. So do you think if I waved the jar of flicker beetles in front of you, that your eyes would light up, too? Because that would be awesome if they did."

He barely kept himself from laughing as Harper blinked in shock, her jaw dropping open. Then the girl frowned at Matthias, lips pursed.

"You dummy." He saw Harper's mouth arch into a little smile as she said that.

"Girls are evil," Matthias mumbled.

And then everyone started to laugh.

* * *

Matthias huffed as he carried the bunch of bananas towards the dinghy. Harper was being bossy again and making him and Samuel carry the fruits while she sat the tree, whacking them down with a machete.

"Isn't this enough?" he heard Samuel yell up to Harper. The girl just grinned and continued hacking.

The _Hildegard_ had landed in Enhambre yesterday, in Nillea. The captain had given the sailors "shore leave," or something, for two days until the ships were loaded and ready to go. That also meant Samuel and Harper were free, too. Well, technically, Samuel had said. They still kind of had to follow and help the captain, but today—the second day at port—Captain Yshae and let them free until the night. Since Samuel and Harper had grown up around here, they'd plotted to visit a small, nearby island to the south.

Since exploring new places was awesome, he was tagging along. Of course, Mother and Father didn't want him wandering alone in a strange new place, so they'd told him to stay close. He generally did what his parents asked of him—well, kind of—but then he realized it would be actually okay. He wasn't going alone, after all!

So he'd left a note by his parent's bedroom, gotten dressed, and ran down to the beach where the two midshipmen were. Samuel had borrowed a small boat from a friend of his family, and they rowed for about an hour to the southern tip of the small island.

The island was nice. No one lived here, according to Harper, so if there was anything interesting to take, no one would miss it. So here they were, about fifty feet into the forest with the banana trees.

Harper chopped down one last bunch—that made four—and carried it to the waiting boat, which they'd dragged onto the sand—"beached"—and tied to an old tree stump. Together, he, Harper, and Samuel dumped the fruits into a small chest in the back of the dinghy. He'd never eaten a banana before, so he'd asked how to eat them, but Samuel had told them they had to be a little more yellow before they were good to eat, after which you had to peel it, or something. Oh well, he could wait.

They walked along the beach a little further, and found something that Harper called a tidal pool. When they looked inside, they found it was full of sea animals. Harper and Samuel pointed out fish—baby cod, eels, gobies—and weird looking things like urchins, starfish, anemones, and barnacles. There were also shellfish like mussels, abalone, scallops, whelks, limpets, shrimp, and these, wide, armored looking thing with lots of legs, pincers, and beady eyes on stalks, which were called crabs. Samuel and Harper were excited about those.

It was amazing, honestly. Back at home there'd been tide pools, too, but the water was usually cold and hard to see into, and the things living there hadn't been nearly as interesting.

Harper ordered him and Sam to go back to the boat and pick up the second chest, as well as the small bailing bucket. Samuel started to argue that, no way, it was time for Harper to do some real work, but by then the girl had already started rolling up her dungarees, ignoring them.

So, grumbling things about bossy girls—which was so true!—Samuel followed him back to the boat to grab the stuff.

When they got back to the pool, Harper was nowhere to be seen. Huh? Where'd the girl go? He set the chest down and moved closer to have a _gah_!

He yelped and stumbled to the side as a fish came flying out of nowhere and almost smacked him in the face. He overbalanced and fell onto his butt in the sand. Harper poked her head up from the pool, look at him, sniggered once, and bent back down.

He scowled. Next to him, Samuel picked up the flopping eel, whacked it on the head with the spine of the machete, and tossed it into the bucket. He heard a splash, and suddenly another eel came flying of the pool, along with a cod. He actually managed to catch the eel, only for it to wiggle out of his hands. He chased it along the beach while Samuel smacked the cod.

Gotcha! He grabbed the eel and threw it to the other boy, who caught it, fumbled it, killed it, and put it in the bucket. That went on for another ten minutes as Harper batted fish to them and he and Samuel threw them into the pail.

"How does she do that?" he asked Samuel as more fish rained down.

"Well, she's a cat _and_ a fisherman, which makes her like a... super fisherman," Samuel answered. Then the other boy called to Harper, "Full!"

The rain of fish stopped. Harper's head again appeared above the lip of the tide pool as Samuel lugged the bucket over and splashed some water into it.

"Okay! Shellfish!"

This time all three of them got into the pool. Samuel and Harper started yanking various shellfish from the rocks. He followed their lead. Man, some of the—oof—critters were really stuck on there good. He managed to pry off his first mussel, but by then the midshipmen had a handful of their own.

Aw. He didn't want to be the slowpoke. He turned back to look at the water and spied a crab that seemed to be looking at him with its googly eyes. He reached his hand towards it, then stopped.

The crab had a hard shell, and pincers. Hard plus pincers would equal ouch.

Slowly, he moved his hand to the rear of the crab. It didn't move. With a quick movement, he scooped up the creature from behind and clamped down on it with his thumb. The crab waved its pincers around helplessly.

He noticed that Samuel and Harper had stopped their collecting and were looking at him.

"What?" he asked.

Samuel laughed, and gave Harper a little shove on shoulder. "See? I told you he'd be smart enough not to get pinched!"

He stuck his tongue out at Harper, who just rolled her eyes at him. Humph.

They went back to their hunting, and got the chest filled up in less than an hour. Harper was practically drooling over their catch.

Right. Kitties. Fish. And, apparently, mussels and crabs.

They hauled the chest and bucket back to the boat. He looked up at the sun. Hmm. A little past noon. If they left right now, they could get back to town, get the fish delivered to the cook on the ship, and still have a couple of hours to look around town before Harper and Samuel had to report to Captain Yshae. Yeah, that looked like it could work. He mentioned it to the two, and they all decided it was a good idea. Awesome.

They started to push the boat away from the sand when Harper suddenly jerked her head up to look toward the treeline up the beach.

"Harper?" he asked.

"Something's watching us," the girl said, frowning.

Right as the words left Harper's mouth he heard a crash from the trees. He jerked his head around to look, and saw two people sprinting towards their boat.

The first was a bot who only looked a few years older than Samuel, with hair a shade lighter than Father's. The boy had a heavy rucksack strapped to his back and a large sack thrown over his shoulders. The person behind the boy was a wiry, dark-skinned lady in shorts and a sleeveless top. And, oh yeah, she had bunny ears coming out her head. A neocolom?

But the thing is, he didn't know what they wanted. Father always said to be polite, but at the same time to be careful. Almost without thinking, his hand closed on the handle of the sheathed machete. He didn't draw it or show it, but he did make sure it could be freed quickly. He gulped, his heart beating a little faster. Father and Sir Davien had taught him basic swordsmanship but—

"Move! Faster!" the running boy shouted at them. "Hurry!"

"Wait!" he shouted back "Who are you? What do you wan—"

"_They're gonna eat us_!" the neocolom lady wailed.

* * *

"Is it wrong that I'm worried about Matthias?" Rex heard his wife ask.

"No, not at all," he replied. "I'm worried, too. Not _too_ worried, since Matty's a smart kid, as are Samuel and Harper. But you're right, having that boy out of sight for so long is just... odd."

In the morning he and Ellis had found a note outside their apartment door with Matthias' messy scrawl. The two midshipman and he were going to explore on their own. They'd debated going after Matthias to keep him close, but eventually they decided there wouldn't be any harm in letting Matty's curiosity run its course.

It wasn't unpleasant, actually. He was able to have a date of sorts with Ellis, which he hadn't the time—or privacy—for in the past decade. His wife hadn't seen Nillea in almost thirty years, and he had never been here himself, so they wanted to some exploring of their own. They weren't completely alone, since Sir Davien and the knights were shadowing them from a respectable distance, and they kept running into Murmin and Vashtor, who were also venturing around the town together themselves. The town was also crawling with Enhambre Transoceanic crew and personnel, and they caught sight of Buckland, Yshae, and Kilik on several occasions.

He jerked to a stop as Ellis, who he was holding hands with, came to a halt.

"Sweetheart?" he asked.

"Just a few minutes, dear," his wife murmured distractedly, letting go of his hand. Ellis made a beeline for a large shop that had several women's garments display out in front. After stopping to finger the material of a brightly-colored vest, Ellis disappeared inside.

Good grief.

Resigning himself to his fate, he took a seat on a wrought-iron bench that was placed outside the the building. Ellis wasn't a materialistic person, but when she did manage to find a shop that interested her, she'd vanish for hours.

He sighed, and was debating entering the store to at least keep Ellis company when he heard footsteps off to the side.

"Rex," he heard Vashtor say.

"Vashtor," he replied, rising from his seat and offering his hand to the gurg. He and the taller man shook in the arm-forearm grip that was the common form of greeting in Graccea. He noticed a glaring absence. "Where's Murmina?"

Vashtor pointed to the shop Ellis had entered. He snorted. Women. It figured.

"Ellis?" the gurg asked.

He also pointed to the shop.

"Well, I suppose if they're going to spend their time there, I could show you a place that might interest you," Vashtor said.

He almost jumped at the opportunity, but, one, he didn't want to seem so pathetically desperate, and two, while he found the idea of browsing women's garments mind-numbingly boring—even with Ellis—he also didn't want to leave his wife behind.

Oh...

"Sir Davien?" he called over his shoulder.

"Milord, my companions can watch over the Countess while I accompany you." He laughed inwardly as he realized Davien wanted to flee, too. "Although I don't think it will be needed. The town is orderly enough, and even if there's a problem I am sure the Countess and Dame Murmina can take care of themselves."

Well, that settled it, then. Point of no return, etcetera etectera. "All right. Vashtor, lead the way."

They set out east of the town squad, he and Vashtor side by side with Davien trailing behind by a few paces.

The walk was mostly silent, since Vashtor had never been talkative, and he himself wasn't one to bring up inanities. He looked at the gurg out of the corner of his eye. He always wondered that Vashtor was thinking. It never showed on the man's face, that was for sure.

Maybe it showed in Vashtor's dress. The gurg was apparently done with armor, since now Vashtor only wore simple black leather trousers and a black short-sleeved shirt of woven cotton or wool. The ensemble was completed with a heavy black, hooded cloak, black leather boots and a baldric where Vashtor mounted his massive longsword.

Well, at least Vashtor still did black.

Interestingly enough, though, the gurg's baldric wasn't leather, as most were, but instead made up of a series of thick metal links, like a sash made of mail. Odd look.

He squinted when he saw a satchel underneath the cloak, partly open. He caught a flash of blue fabric.

Curious. If it wasn't black for Vashtor, it would be red. Blue, never.

What had he said about inanities? Well, he was throwing that out the window.

"Never thought you would be one to accessorize with blue, Vashtor," he said with a smile. The gurg's eyebrows rose in surprise, which wasn't something you saw often. Then the moment passed and Vashtor's expression returned to neutral.

"It's not mine. It's for Murmina."

If wearing blue was Vashtor never did, he couldn't even fathom what the buying of gifts was. In the—admittedly short—time he'd known Vashtor, not once had the gurg ever gifted something to someone. It wasn't because of unfriendliness or rudeness, it just wasn't _Vashtor_.

He left it at that. He didn't want to pry any more than he had, but the pale man pulled the object out of the bag. It was a long scarf, navy blue, without any tassels or extra decorations on it. It looked like there were some reinforcing patches of blue-dyed leather sewn along the edges at regular intervals. Vashtor offered it to him, so he hefted it. The scarf was light, yet had a density to it. And, despite its relative thinness, it felt like it would be very warm. He handed the garment back to Vashtor, who put it back in the bag.

"It's difficult for harpuia to clothe themselves," Vashtor explained. "It's usually cold when they're high up in the sky, so they have to keep warm. However, they can't layer on too much clothing, since it would be extra weight for them to carry and the bulkiness might impede their movement. Their clothing can't be too loose, otherwise it would billow in the wind and tangle in their wings. On the other hand, it also can't be too tight, since it will restrict their wings' range of motion. A scarf like that is very practical. It can be tightened to keep their neck and jaw warm while they're flying, and easily loosened for comfort when they're on the ground. In dusty conditions they can wrap it around their mouth and nose to block the grit. It can also be used as a makeshift belt or sash if they need to carry more equipment,or an emergency sling in case they injure themselves."

Okay, things made sense now. It was a completely practical piece of equipment for a fellow comrade. Nothing strange at all.

"Also," Vashtor said, hesitating for a brief moment, "it goes well with her hair, doesn't it?"

Okay. Never mind. Scratch that last. Things were suddenly stranger.

Vashtor didn't seem to notice as he stopped walking, staring, as he tried to wrap his head around that. Then his brain caught up and he took a few quick steps to catch up with the gurg.

"Vashtor," he asked, "You knew my great-grandfather, right?"

"Correct," the other man replied. "My connection with the Raglan line began with Ladius Raglan, and continued with Thoma, Duran, and you."

"Right," he said, nodding. "Murmina never knew any of my ancestors, did she? I was the first Raglan she ever met."

"You could argue that she met them for a few weeks when they were brought back to this plane to evict the gods from the continents, but otherwise yes, you'd be correct."

"So she really wouldn't have much of a personal reason to request leave to see the monuments being erected in Lucrellia."

Vashtor didn't say anything for a few moments. Then, "Yes, you would be right."

They continued on for another few blocks, silent. The last topic didn't exactly lend it self to further conversation, that was for sure.

"She also never told them," Vashtor said suddenly.

He cocked his head, not understanding.

"Between the time of Chaos' fall and our commission as vanguard scouts, I was helping with the reconstruction of Uttara Kulu. Many of the harpuia who were helping with the rebuilding, and many of the new soldiers, had had relatives and friends in the fortress when it was destroyed. I'd personally led the attack that killed them. Killed many of them myself personally." Vashtor paused for a few heartbeats. "Not once did she tell them. She could have, and they would have in all likelihood have killed me, with the death of their friends so fresh in their minds. Murmina would have not have violated the promise she had made to you. Yet she didn't say a thing"

Vashtor looked thoughtful for a few moments, which was just as unusual as the surprise he'd seen earlier.

Someday, when they had more time, he should talk with Vashtor. He didn't know the man as well as his ancestors did, but that didn't change the fact that they couldn't have freed Agarest without him.

He couldn't ever hope to understand what this new, changing relationship between Murmina and Vashtor was, but from what little he had learned, it sounded like it was moving in a positive direction. And that made him glad.

"Ah, we're here," Vashtor said, coming to a stop.

His eyes widened in surprise. It was an armory, set up next to a smithy. Through the shops windows he could see all matter of armor, swords, spear, axes, and anything else that was metal and sharp.

"Well, I guess I can forgive my wife," he mused. I have a feeling I'm going to spend as much time in here as she is going to be looking at dresses."

* * *

"Wait, what?" Matthias asked as the neocolom and boy reached their boat. "They're gonna _what_?"

"_Eat us_!" the new neocolom yelled. "We have to run! Float! Whatever!"

"What are you—" he started to say, when another crash from the treeline made him look away from the strangers.

Eight things came into view. They were big, probably as big as Vashtor, and looked like huge, staring, unblinking eyes, as big as his head, surrounded by shadowy mist or fog. The eyeball creatures just floated there, by the trees, as the boy and rabbit neocolom shoved the boat into the waves. Then, all together, the eye monsters started gliding down the beach towards them.

Okay, he kind of got what the lady was saying. The five of them piled into the boat. He quickly grabbed the paddles, tossed one to Samuel, and started heaving with everything he had. They were about twenty feet out when the eyeballs reached the waterline and stopped. Phew. Looked like they didn't want to get wet. They were safe for now.

"Don't paddle out too far," Harper, who was by the front of the boat, said. "We've got a lot of weight, and the waves are are starting to get choppy. We'll have to stick close to the island until we're close enough to Nillea."

Ah, that made him unhappy. They had to go around the island—they were on the south end—until they moved far enough north that they could head directly towards where the _Hildegard_ had docked. He looked back towards the land. The eye-things were floating at the edge of the water, following them.

Creepy.

"Well, at least we're safe for now," the new boy said. He heard him sigh. "Well, I guess we should introduce ourselves. My names's Fer. I'm a nelth, if you were wondering."

Oh, a nelth. He kind of knew about them. They were small and looked young. Well, until they looked old. Or something. But in any case, it probably meant Fer was older than he looked.

"And I'm Qua," the neocolom said.

"Matthias," he said, huffing a bit as he rowed.

"Samuel."

"Harper," said the girl.

He saw Qua blink, nose twitching. Then the rabbit neocolom lunged closer to Harper, causing yelps as the boat rocked a bit. Qua sniffed again, then started combing through the blonde's hair with her hands.

"Eep," squeaked Harper.

"Huh," Qua said, still sniffing. "I swear I smell neocolom on you. But human ears and no tail. You didn't, like steal someone clothes or anything, right? That'd be bad."

He watched Harper shake her head. "I'm half. I just didn't get the ears or tail."

"Oh," Qua said, scratching her chin. "That makes sense."

The rabbit neocolom suddenly leaned back, rocking the boat dangerously and causing Fer to yell at Qua to stop moving around so much.

After ten minutes, Qua offered to take the paddles, so the three of them carefully shifted so the neocolom could get seated correctly. They started moving a lot faster as soon as that happened, though not faster than the eyes-things that were trailing them.

"What are those things," he asked Fer.

The nelth made a face. "Devil's eyes. Real nasty phantom creatures."

"Oh. Why where they chasing you?"

"To eat us," Qua said.

"Well, yes, but they wanted to eat us because we woke them up."

"Huh?"

"You see, Qua and I are treasure hunters. Well, I do most of the hunting, and Qua usually just punches whatever tries to kill us."

"Hey, you make it sound like I don't do anything useful," he heard Qua protest.

"Punching things so we don't die is important! Besides, remember that one time? When you failed to disarm that trap? You were hanging upside down for two hours before I managed to get you down. And that was only after I escaped a cave full of trolls."

He heard Harper snort.

"But anyway," Fer said, turning back to him, "we were poking through an ancient burial site, and found some of the offerings people made when they still buried people here." Fer reached down and opened the bag he'd brought aboard. He caught a glimpse of a lot of things that were shiny and golden as the nelth reached inside. Fer brought out two gold cups—goblets?—and a large silver bowl, which the nelth set on the floor of the boat.

"There, payment for giving us a ride."

They—well, Qua—paddled for a little more. The neocolom was really strong, so they were moving a lot faster on the return trip.

They didn't talk much. They seemed like nice people, but they were still strangers. He didn't know what to talk about with them.

"Matthias, mind if I ask you a question?" Fer asked half an hour later.

"Um, sure."

"What are you? I can see you have pointed ears, but I can't tell if you're a nelth, one of the elves, or a greer."

"Well, he can't be a greer," Qua quipped. "He'd be shorter and hairier."

"I guess," Fer said.

"Well," he answered, "I'm a mix. I'm a tiny bit syrium, a little bit dark elf, a little more human, and a lot more high elf." He forgot the exact fractions. Fractions were evil.

"Well, you don't say?" Fer said, cocking an eyebrow. "That's very interesting. I haven't run into many people with that kind of lineage. In fact, the last person who did was a man named—"

"Land ho!" he heard Harper yell.

Cool! Almost home.

* * *

Ellis sighed as she met up with her husband in the town square. Rex was carrying a rolled up bundle, and she could clearly see sword hilts.

She smiled, struggling to contain her laughter. "Oh, Rex," she said with an exaggerated sigh.

Her husband's face had the same expression, a wide grin that was quivering as it tried to keep from laughing. Rex had obviously seen her own bundle. "Oh, Ellis," her husband said in the same way.

Murmina popped into view, carrying her own bundle, which was admittedly much smaller.

"Oh, brother," said Murmina, in her usual deadpan.

Nothing.

Then she started laughing, which set Rex off, and then Murmina. Behind her husband Davien got in a few chortles while Vashtor grinned slightly.

She had to put shift the bundle to her other arm so she could clutch her side, it was hurting so much from the laughing.

A few minutes and a little pain later, they'd managed to stop. Rex explained his purchase to her.

"They're some cheap arming swords, backswords, and longswords I saw at the smithy," her husband told her. "Unsharpened. Not very good quality steel, and not a good job on the tempering. I figured I could use these as training swords."

She held up a hand. "Wait, so dull swords of bad quality?"

"Er, yes."

She looked past her husband at Davien, who was grinning widely. "Sir Davien, please tell me..."

"Yes, Countess, I made sure he get a good price on the blades."

Rex gave a long suffering sigh. She smiled. Her husband was many things, but a good haggler wasn't one of them. Luckily, Davien wasn't nearly as bad at it as Rex was.

Rex pointed down at her package. "And you?"

She cocked an eyebrow at Rex. "Just some blankets for our cabin. These one are much more _comfortable_ than what we have in the cabin." She had a sudden desire to wink suggestively at her husband, but with so many people watching it would just be scandalous.

Ohhh... goodness.

She winked at Rex. Her husband stared blankly for a few breaths, then a wide grin stretched across his face.

During that time, she saw Vashtor reach under his cloak and hand something to Murmina. The harpuia unfolded a finely made, leather reinforced blue scarf.

Cocking her head, Murmina wrapped it around her neck.

"Mmm. Very comfortable. Warm. Soft. Feels durable. Thank you."

Vashtor made a noncommittal noise.

She noticed how it matched nicely with Murmina's hair.

"It also goes very well with your hair," she told the younger woman.

Murmina frowned, looking down at the scarf as if seeing it for the first time. Then the harpuia turned to Vashtor, an odd look on her face. "Yeah. Yeah, it does."

The gurg just stood there impassively, face unreadable.

Well, that was probably as much as they were going to get out of Vashtor.

Rex's stomach rumbled.

With a laugh at that they walked down to the waterfront shops, where there was a large collection of eateries and pastry shops. Hmm. She was a bit hungry as well. Some food wouldn't be unwelcome.

She stopped when she heard Vashtor suddenly say "Murmina?"

She turned. The harpuia had shielded her eyes against the afternoon sun and was peering over the water at an island to the south, presumably the one Matthias and the midshipmen had visited.

"That's odd," she heard Murmina say. "I see seven... no, eight... devil's eyes hovering along that island over there. They never show themselves unless they have a victim."

Her skin crawled. She remembered those creatures. She'd met her fair share of them here, in fact, thirty years ago.

Murmina continued to scan over the water. "Wait, I see a boat coming this way. I can't see who's in it because of all the glare, but I think I see five people."

Five people. So not her son and the midshipmen.

Murmina stiffened suddenly. "Dammit, the eyes just faded."

Her throat went dry, Devil's eyes only did that when they went in for the kill.

"Vashtor!" Murmina yelled. Without a word the gurg dropped to one knee, fingered laced together near the ground. As she watched, Murmina drew her pistol and put one foot into Vashtor's linked hands. With a grunt, the gurg straightened, launching the harpuia into the sky. Murmina flapped towards the boat.

She moved closer to the waterfront railing, trying to see. Nothing. She didn't have the vision of a harpuia.

But she could see that the ocean had grown choppy. If the phantoms attacked, Murmina would have difficulty getting a clean shot. The people in the boat were in serious danger.

Before she knew it she had dropped her bundle and was running as fast as she could towards the nearest pier. There was a metallic clatter right behind her, and she knew Rex had just done the same thing. Rex quickly passed her as he ran, driving down towards the wharf. Her husband didn't have the same powerful magic as she did, but he still had the power of the Spirit Vessel, which was amazingly potent in its own way.

By the time she reached him, her husband had drawn his golden-bladed sword, and twin streams of energy—one blue-white, the other shadowy indigo—were seeping from Rex's hands to permeate the blade. She began to gather her own power to herself, light energy and elemental magic from Agarest itself. Years ago, she had required a wand to properly focus her energy. Now, she had enough control over it that she had only to gesture, and she could unleash incredible power. A focus still made it easier, but she no longer needed it.

She focused her mind entirely on the unseen boat ahead of her. She still needed to be very precise, otherwise she could kill the people just as easily as the devil's eyes could.

There! The boat came into view... just as eyes faded back into visibility.

She heard two sharp cracks from above, and twin meteors—bullets infused and charged with Murmina's magic—smashed into the two farthest phantoms, ripping pieces from them and pummeling what was left into the water.

The remaining six danced around the boat. Any second now they would make their move on the boat and its occupants.

No.

Spreading her arms, she sent her power forth. Around the boat, a quartet of brilliant white orbs snapped into existence, crackling with heat and power.

Concentrate... concentrate...

The devil's eyes glided towards the boat, the shadowy mantles surrounding their eyes flaring wide.

She drew her hands down and across, as she were throwing something from both hands.

"_Yah_!" she yelled as she released the spell.

The spheres flared blindingly bright for a split second, before twisting and elongating into javelins of light that speared four of the phantoms and burned them to mist.

The surviving two devil's eyes skated away from the boat before launching themselves into the sky, towards the circling Murmina.

"_Grah_!" she heard Rex grunt beside her as he swung his sword. A bolt of energy, half light and half shadow, flashed away from Rex's blade to rise up and meet the phantoms. The spirit energy slammed into them, evaporating the last two phantoms into nothingness.

Heart still beating fast from the adrenaline, she lowered her arms to her sides, letting her remaining power dissipate into the air. Next to her Rex sheathed his sword and likewise let his pent up Vessel power bleed away. A moment later Murmina touched down next to them, holstering her pistol as she landed.

"Are they all right?" she asked the harpuia.

"Yes, except for being soaked," Murmina answer. Suddenly, the younger woman grinned. "And one of them in particular is going to have a case of hero worship for his parents."

"Good," she said, exhaling. "I was worried that I might capsize..." She jerked her head up and turned to look at Murmina. "Wait, what?"

* * *

Even with the hot temperature, the breeze had started to pick up, so Ellis had wrapped up her son, Harper, and Samuel in the blankets she'd just gotten. Seawater probably wasn't good for the material, but that was so low on her list of priorities that it didn't even register.

She was deciding how enraged to be at Qua and Fer.

She'd fought beside the two of them before, and she was fully confident that the nelth and rabbit neocolom would have no problem dispatching or eluding eight devil's eyes.

But not on a boat in the middle of the bay. Not when her _son_ was there. In that case, any confidence she had in them plummeted to _zero_.

"What were you _thinking_!?" she hissed at the pair.

"Ellis, please," her husband said gently. "That tone's not going to help anything. Let them explain themselves."

Suddenly, irrationally, she wheeled on her husband. One look at Rex' face, though, and she found herself turning back to glare at Fer and Qua.

If she hadn't known Rex as well as she did, his calm manner of speaking might had led her to believe that her son's near-fatal experience hadn't fazed Rex at all. But she saw the quivering in in her husband's lips, the set of his jaw, the hardness in his eyes. If anything, Rex was even more furious than she was.

Fer blinked, looking between her and Rex.

Kilik took that as a sign to motion people away. A crowd of onlookers had gathered even before their son's boat had moored. Fortunately, Kilik, Yshae, Buckland, and a group of Enhambre Transoceanic sailors had found them. Kilik had said a few words, and most of the crowd had dispersed. The rest were kept back by the sailors. Kilik's company was apparently very influential and popular in the area, so people generally did what he asked.

So now it was just her, Rex, Matthias, Samuel, Harper, and Yshae. The captain had positioned herself behind the two midshipmen, a hand clapped on their shoulders.

"They weren't in any danger," Fer said slowly, carefully. "Devil's eyes have to make physical contact to drain a victim. And while they're very powerful if they latch onto you, when they move into attack they're easy to fight off. I was armed" Fer motioned to the pair of breaker discs the nelth had hooked up to his belt. "And you know how hard Qua hits.

"On top of that, devil's eyes can't interact with inanimate objects. They couldn't capsize the boat and put us in the water. We would have been fine once we reached land. They would have gotten too far from their haunts to continue pursuing. And even if they were still able to follow us, Qua and I would have them beat on solid land."

As Fer finished she started to feel the intense anger start to drain away a little. Not completely, though. A dozen things could have happened. Their own motions could have capsized the boat. One of the phantoms might have tried a hypnosis attack. One of the kids might have panicked. They could have—

"Captain, ma'am, permission to speak?" she heard Samuel ask.

"Granted, Midshipman," Yshae said, lips tight.

Samuel looked at her and Rex. "Count, Countess, sir, ma'am, Mister Fer told us the exact same things that he just said right now. He told us to stay as still as possible and not to look them in the eye for longer than a few seconds. Mister Fer had his weapons out and was ready to defend us."

Yshae frowned. "Midshipman Harper, is this true?"

"Yes, Captain, just as Midshipman Samuel said, ma'am."

"It's true, Mother, Father," Matthias said suddenly. "Qua also said she'd jump in the water to lead them away if they got too close."

She shifted her gaze to the rabbit neocolom, who looked at the ground abashedly and kicked an imaginary pebble.

The anger drained away completely, just leaving her feeling jumpy and tired. It made sense, rationally. Fer and Qua knew their way around danger, and she'd fought devil's eyes enough to know their strengths and their weaknesses.

Of course, as she was finding out, she turned irrational if her son was in danger. Guess this was just part of being a mother.

She felt a a hand give her shoulder a comforting squeeze. She didn't even have to look around to know it was Rex.

Then she heard her son's stomach grumble, followed by Harper's, Samuel's... and Rex's.

"Um... is there food anywhere?" her son asked plaintively.

She laughed quietly to herself and rubbed her son's head.

* * *

Rex leaned back in his chair and wondered if he needed to loosen his sword belt.

They'd sat down at a small eatery that advertised an extensive dinner menu. After they'd been seated, Fer had walked up to the owner and handed over three exquisitely decorated silver plates and a gold-gilded pitcher. Fer had asked if that was enough for all-you-can eat for their group. The owner just nodded woodenly and hurried away with the payment.

Heh. One of the plates would have been enough.

The food had soothed his nerves a little bit. Just like Ellis, he's been on the verge of screaming at Fer and Qua for endangering his son. Luckily, he hadn't done that, mostly because he was forcing outward calm for Ellis' sake. Fer and Qua were good friends, and he might have said something extremely damaging if he'd had half a chance.

He loved his son so much, and that danger, minimal as it was when examined calmly, had almost driven him insane.

Thankfully, rich biscuits, grilled grouper, a large medium-rare steak, and a large bowl of lobster bisque had calmed him down enough that he wasn't going to go raging at anyone.

During the dinner—he, Ellis, and Kilik and explained to Fer and Qua about the monuments and their emigration to Lucrellia. The two of them had been surprised. Since they had no established home or address, Zerva's letters never reached them.

He looked to his right, where Matthias sat between him and Ellis. The poor kid was nodding off, even though it wasn't even dark yet. Across from Matty, Harper and Samuel didn't look much better.

"I'll take him back to the room," Ellis said to him quietly. "He's about to pass out on his lobster."

"All right," he said.

"Hey, big guy, he said, shaking his son gently on the shoulders. Go with Mother."

"Yeah, Matty, let's get you cleaned up and into bed.

"Mmm," he heard his son mumble. Matthias rose without protest, and Ellis got an arm around their son's shoulders.

"I'll see you tonight," he said to Ellis. "Love you."

"Love you too," his wife replied, bending down to give him a quick kiss. "Take care."

He smiled as Ellis and Matthias left the eatery for the apartment.

"I think that would be a good idea as well, Midshipmen," Yshae said to the drowsy Harper and Samuel.

"If you say so, ma'am," Harper said muzzily.

"I'm fine, ma'am," Samuel protested, right before yawning.

"Orders are orders, cadet," Yshae said with a smile. "Let's go, Midshipmen." The captain turned to Kilik. "Sir, I'll be in my inn room. If you need anything, send a runner my way."

Kilik just nodded.

The captain jockeyed the two midshipmen into motion, where they followed the dark elf into the town. That just left himself, Kilik, Murmina, Vashtor, Fer, and Qua in the diner.

The Enhambre Transoceanic president turned to Fer and Qua.

"Sooo... now that you know about the monuments in Lucrellia, would you be interested in a charter?"

He snorted quietly as the nelth and neocolom were taken aback. From what he'd remembered, they had joined up with the Raglan clan during Duran's travels through Enhambre. They probably remembered Kilik as a high seas pirate, not a... business pirate.

Fer and Qua looked at each other, then back to Kilik.

"Uh, sure," Fer said. "How much...?"

He smirked. As Sir Davien had taught him just this afternoon, you never started up negotiations with "how much." That was bad.

He saw Kilik smile, and knew that president was thinking the same thing. "May I see your treasure sack there, Fer?"

The nelth looked incredibly unsure, but he reluctantly handed it over,

Another rule: never let the seller see how much money you had. Poor Fer.

In quick succession, Kilik extracted eleven decorative plates, seven cups and goblets, four bowls, and a dozen assorted bracelets and necklaces. He saw Kilik stare at the loot for a moment, before returning five plates, four of the cups, two bowls, and six pieces of the assorted jewelry back into Fer's sack. The nelth made a choking noise as Kilik handed the bag back.

"Isn't that a bit... much?" Fer asked, still looking like he didn't believe he'd just lost half of his treasure.

"Well, it's perfectly reasonable," Kilik said, without a hint hesitation. "You're commissioning the character less than a day before we leave. That's going to force us to rearrange personnel, equipment, and supplies to accommodate you. So a little extra seems reasonable, don't you think?"

He didn't point out that Kilik had never quoted a price for there to be "extra" of.

"Well, yeah, I guess," Fer said, looking a bit stunned.

Third rule: never agree with the seller.

"Good, good, glad we can agree to that. Also, there was the matter of earlier today. While, yes, the chance of danger was slim, especially with the Count, Countess, and Vanguard Scout Murmina to help, there was still a chance that they could've gotten hurt. That was endangering important ET personnel, since Midshipmen Samuel and Harper are valuable officer cadets aboard the flagship, the _Hildegard_. You must understand the need for some additional compensation, yes?"

"Y-yeah."

The bewildered nelth turned to look at Vashtor. As usual, the gurg's face was unreadable. Fer looked to Murmina, who was doing almost as good a job as Vashtor at appearing blank. The harpuia had leaned forward, steepling her finger in front of her mouth. From his angle he could see the grin that kept tugging at Murmina's mouth.

Then Fer turned to him, pleading in his eyes.

His anger had long since faded out, so wasn't inclined to agree with Kilik out of spite towards Fer and Qua. On the other hand, it was... entertaining to see the normally happy-go-lucky Fer squirm a bit. But on a hypothetical third hand, Fer and Qua were valuable friends. He really should do something.

"If I you don't mind my input," he said to Kilik after a pause, "The price might be a _bit_ too steep."

"I welcome input," Kilik said. "How much of a reduction were you thinking, Count Roaring Cove?"

"I was thinking..." he reached towards Kilik's share of the treasure.

Fer's eyes lit up.

He put his finger on the smallest, most battered bracelet, and pushed it over to the nelth.

"There, I believe that is perfect."

Fer's face dropped.

"Splendid," Kilik said, leaning forward to offer a hand to Fer. The nelth shook Kilik's hand, still looking a bit dazed."We leave tomorrow, a little after dawn, on the outgoing tide. Welcome aboard."


	4. Chapter 3: Fendias - Tlalocan

_**AGAREST LEGACIES**_

**By Greg Wong**

* * *

**Chapter 3: Fendias - Tlalocan**

* * *

They left maybe an hour after dawn.

Interestingly enough, they didn't head for open seas, but went southwest a little, towards a chain of islands.

Rex has asked Kilik about it. The businessman had said there was some important personnel they needed to pick up.

Personnel, eh? Who could be out here?

At about noon he saw the sailors reducing the sails—"reefing" them—and heard the anchor dropped over the side. Nearby, the two caravels, _Star Of Nillea_ and _Fortuitous __Winds_, also came to a stop and dropped anchor. They were about half a mile away from the nearest island, so the whole thing was making him more and more confused.

"Prepare to receive the colom representative!" he heard Bosun Buckland boom from the main deck. He and Ellis were standing on the poop deck, watching the _Hildegard_'s sailors.

Colom? As in a yulishee tribe?

To his surprise, a couple of crewmen lifted a four-foot section of the portside railing away. Huh. It was detachable. Never knew a ship could do that. A moment later Kilik, Yshae, and the two midshipmen came out of the stateroom and headed toward the gap in the railing.

He turned to his wife. "Should we?" he asked.

Ellis shrugged. "I don't suppose it would hurt anything. To be honest, I'm curious about what it's all about, too."

He nodded. Offering an arm to his wife, he walked down the stairs and strolled over to Kilik. He heard the patter of running feet, and suddenly Matthias was there, too.

"And where were _you_, Matty?" he asked, he asked his son.

"Oh, looking around the ship some more. Samuel and Harper had to help the captain with something. Charts and stuff. Oh! I was looking around the galley. I think we'll be having crabs for dinner."

"Oh, that's nice," Ellis said. "I haven't had those in a long time."

"Are they good?" Matthias asked.

"Very."

"Cool."

There was a rustle of movement as Buckland yelled "Stand by!" and leaned out over the gap, one hand gripping the railing. He and Ellis moved a bit, so they had an angle that let them see into the water. Nothing on the surface. Maybe—

Without warning something flashed out from under the surface, too fast for him to track easily. Buckland reached out and snagged it out of the air as it passed him. Impressive.

Especially considering what the bosun had just caught looked like a trident or partisan with well-honed edges. He heard jingling and clinking around him, and saw some of the watching sailors exchanging money.

He glanced at his wife, eyebrows raised. Ellis just shrugged, puzzled.

The bosun stepped away from the gap and said to Kilik, "All yours, sir."

With a nod to the bosun, the ET president took the same position as Buckland had. The bosun ambled over to him and his family.

"You'll get to see an impressive entrance today, sir," the heavyset man said, gesturing to where Kilik stood.

He had absolutely no idea what that meant, but okay.

"Bosun, good catch," a nearby sailor said, tossing Buckland a small sack. The bosun caught it one-handed. From the jingling sound it made, it was presumably full of coin. He looked at the sack, then back to Buckland, a questioning look on his face.

"Oh, this?" Buckland jingled the coins and waved the polearm. "Well, Count, you see, every time this happens some of the boys make bets on whether I'll catch the partisan or if it'll take my hand off. Seeing as I have all ten fingers, I think you know how all the other times went. Ah." Buckland pointed towards the water with his chin. "Look fast, sir and ma'am, or you'll miss it."

No sooner had he looked back towards the ocean when the surface exploded in a geyser of spray. A woman in a diaphanous gown, one hand outstretched, came flying up towards where Kilik stood. With a quick motion, Kilik's free hand grabbed a hold of the woman's, pulling her up. In the same motion, Kilik did a complicated twist, releasing his grip on the railing to get a hand under the woman.

The result was Kilik with the woman in a near picture perfect bridal carry.

Some of the watching sailors clapped, then broke out into enthusiastic cheers and wolf-whistles when the woman gave Kilik a deep kiss on the mouth. His eyebrows raised at that, and a quick glance at Ellis revealed his wife had the same expression.

Oh boy, this was going to take some getting used to.

"In case you weren't familiar with them sir, the lady over there is a yulishee, an ocean-dwelling folk. That particular one is sort of a mediator of sorts with the local coloms, or tribal groups. And, as you just saw, Mister Kilik's woman. You see, the president was able negotiate some business contracts with the coloms, which hired some of their more able-bodied water mages as extra crew for the ships. They use their magics to help propel the ships, so it makes our ocean crossings more time-efficient and helps us when we have to deal with crosswinds or the doldrums. We've yet to make a full ocean crossing, but the president and captain are confident it'll work out."

As the bosun was talking, Kilik had lowered the yulishee to the deck and offered his elbow to her, much like was doing now with Ellis. The pair of them were walking towards him and his family.

The yulishee was waving cheerily at the sailors around her, but when she caught sight of him and Ellis, the woman's draw dropped open and she started to run forward.

Buckland was looking at him and Ellis, so he had no idea what had happened behind.

"And, of course, more often than not we'll get some pretty girls among the yulishee mages, so that's immensely popular with the boys. The president's lady there is also very friendly, and a good healer, so that's nothing but positive as well."

Buckland started to say more, but he wasn't able to hear because the yulishee woman had just cried "Rex! Ellis!"

And then he was wrapped up in a very tight, very wet, hug from Reverie. Eh heh. Good thing it'd been warm and he hadn't worn his coat. He weakly returned the hug. Not because he was reluctant to hug an old friend, but... well, yulishees, Reverie included, didn't exactly wear much. The gown was extremely thin and near transparent due to its wetness. He honestly didn't know where to put his hands.

Thankfully, Reverie took that dilemma out of his hands by moving to hug Ellis with another excited squeal. His wife, who was shorter, smaller, and much less male than he was, was able to return the embrace warmly.

Then Reverie's enthusiasm hit a new ceiling when she caught sight of Matthias. With an excited gasp the yulishee crouched down in front of his son.

"Oh, my goodness! You're so big now, Matthias! Do you remember me?"

Their son, who had a blend of surprise, alarm, and bashfulness on his face, just mutely shook his head. Reverie wasn't hard on the eyes, and getting all this attention from a bubbly, friendly girl who seemed to know him was obviously making him feel self-conscious.

"Aw. I remember you, though! I visited when you were about two or three. You were so little. But now you're so big now! You really don't remember me? My name's Reverie."

Matthias shook his head again. "I don't remember, sorry. But, erm, nice to meet you, Miss Reverie."

"You're so polite and sweet, just like your mother and father!" Reverie exclaimed. "And you're growing up to be a handsome young man too. Also like your father."

The yulishee leaned forward and planted a kiss on Matthias' forehead. As the boy looked absolutely stunned Reverie rose and turned to face him and Ellis, a sunny grin on her face.

He smiled back. It was hard not to. "It's good to see you again, Reverie," he said.

"Of course!" the yulishee said. "We have so much catching up to do!"

* * *

Ellis had wondered if cheerfulness was contagious. She'd never been sure. With Reverie, though, it had to be.

The captain had graciously let them use her stateroom while she, Rex, Kilik, and Reveries talked. Matthias was running around the ship again with Harper and Samuel.

Another yulishee had also boarded the ship—in a much less spectacular fashion; a rope with a loop as a makeshift stirrup had been used to get the younger girl aboard. Reverie introduced the girl as Cienna.

The girl, who seemed a little older than the _Hildegard_'s midshipman and had peaceful gray eyes framed by beautiful green hair a few shades darker than Reverie's own, wore the same yulishee gown as Reverie. Cienna was very pretty but seemed very shy.

Also, the yulishee girl was apparently part of Reverie's colom.

"You see," Reverie explained, "Landa had banished me from the Crystal Lake colom, and that kind of sentence didn't just get commuted. She really didn't have a choice, you know, with the traditions surrounding the Rainbow Shard. However, Landa surprised me by recognizing me as the leader of the Mirror Lake colom... which didn't exist."

She thought about that for a bit. "Ah," she said to Reverie. "So it was her way of getting around your exile, wasn't it?"

"Mm-hmm. I was banished from the colom, but if I was the leader of _another_ colom, it would mean I could still come and visit for, you know, 'diplomatic reasons.' Mirror Lake was on an unoccupied island not far from Crystal Lake, so I wasn't far from Nillea or Landa."

"Which helped immensely with ironing out our contracts with the Enhambre coloms," Kilik added. "Reverie's proximity and status made everything work out in the end."

The way Kilik told it, Reverie had been the linchpin of the negotiations, because she was one of the few yulishee who was comfortable dealing with surface dwellers. Reverie had managed to convince the other coloms that Kilik was looking for a genuine business agreement, one that would be mutually beneficial to both parties. The yulishee water mages would help propel the ships, while Enhambre Transoceanic would compensate them generously and also give participating coloms excellent pricing and priority in any future charters or trading. To Ellis it seemed like Reverie's—and maybe Kilik's—way of trying to open up the traditionally isolationist coloms to the rest of the world. Time would only tell, but she hoped it would. The surface peoples and the yulishee had much to offer to each other.

"It would be silly if I was the leader of a one-person colom, so I tried looking for members. Wasn't very successful, though. Not many of other yulishees wanted to be led by an odd woman like me. The only exception was Cienna, who has a bit of wanderlust herself."

"You are not odd," Cienna said, marking the first time the girl had spoken. The girl's voice had a slow cadence to it that strongly reminded Ellis of Murmina, but with a more... melodious quality.

"Oh, but I am," Reverie said, giving the other yulishee an affectionate pat on the shoulder. "Just ask Rex or Ellis."

"Oh, she's right, Cienna. Reverie's not odd," her husband said.

"Well I'm not so sure," she disagreed. "Perhaps just a slight bit of oddness."

Rex made a show of contemplating that. "On second thought, you might be right. Only slightly. _Very_ slightly."

"But only in a good way," she added. "Much like a certain other somebody." She looked pointedly at Rex.

Her husband put on what was possibly the saddest expression she had ever seen. "What have I done now?"

Oh, gods, they were doing the banter thing again. A small part of her was annoyed that they did this all the time... but the—much—larger part of her enjoyed it to no end.

"Says the man who tried to buy a half-dozen dull, poorly made swords at full price."

"That's just having exceptionally poor bargaining skills!" Rex protested. "Not being strange!"

She sighed heavily, throwing up her hands. "You win, you win. But only because of the puppy-dog eyes."

Ellis noticed Kilik, Reverie, and even Cienna staring at them.

She heard Kilik clear his throat. "Well, Reverie, at least we know what we have to look forward to."

Reverie nodded. "Perhaps. I don't think it'll ever be that bad, though."

"Yes, you're right. It'll be worse."

"Perish the thought."

Cienna, an eyebrow cocked, looked between her and Rex, and Reverie and Killian. The girl pointed to her and Rex. "Theirs was better."

They laughed.

* * *

Matthias craned his neck as the captain's cabin door opened and Mother, Father, Mister Kilik, Miss Reverie, and a girl he'd never seen before came outside onto the deck. It looked like whatever they'd been talking about in the stateroom wasn't finished, because the four adults continued to talk. Adults always talked a lot.

The yulishee girl moved away from the adults, walking around the deck and looking at stuff. She looked at the rigging on the mast for a long time, then the sails, and the various pulleys and blocks. She looked real interested in everything.

Then he saw her fin-ears twitch, and she suddenly spun around to look at him.

His first instinct was to duck behind the storage crate he was behind, but that would be dumb. The girl had already seen him, and it would make him look look disrespectful. Sir Davien always said to be respectful, especially to women. That probably included yulishee girls.

"Um, hello!" he called to the girl, maneuvering around the sailors and objects on the deck. He gave her a little wave, which the yulishee returned the gesture as he got closer.

Wow. She was pretty. He suddenly felt that weird shyness he'd had when he'd been introduced to Miss Murmina and Miss Reverie.

But shyness was bad! He mentally shook himself. Bad, bad, bad!

"My name's Matthias. Nice to meet you. What's your name?" he said, just a teensy bit too rushed.

"My name's Cienna," the girl said, slowly, just like Miss Murmina usually talked. The difference though was that it sounded more... musical, or something. It was a nice voice. "It's nice to meet you to. You're the Count's and Countess' son, yes?"

Oh, she'd met Mother and Father, it looked like. He hadn't seen her talking to them, but then again after Kilik and Reverie had brought his parents into the captain's stateroom he'd wandered off to look around. Must've missed her. Hmm. He wondered if she could do that water-jump thing that Miss Reverie had done. Maybe he'd ask Cienna sometime.

"Yeah. Uh. Yes, yes I'm their son."

"They seem like very kind people. Reverie told me much about them. I've wanted to meet them."

For some reason, he thought about when his parents had unleashed their power on the devil's eyes that had been hunting him and his friends. Mother was a high elf, and he'd heard that high elves had incredible magical power, but it was still awesome to see. He didn't know Father had had that kind of magic though. It was uncommon for a human to have magic power, and rare for a human to show the power his father had. Wait. That just meant his father was rare. Huh.

"Yeah, they're cool," he agreed.

Cienna looked confused. "Cool?"

Oh, right. Cienna lived in the ocean, not in Aegisthus, and especially not near Centan. Was probably as out of touch—tee hee—as Mother and Father.

"It's an expression back on Aegisthus. Means something that's really, uh, neat? Interesting?" Hmm, now that he thought about, it could mean a lot of things, couldn't it?

Cienna nodded, like she understood. "I see." The yulishee scratched her head. "Well, not quite, really. I suppose I can get used to it."

He just shrugged at that. Cienna didn't add anything, and it kind of became awkward and weird as they stood around.

Um.

"Have you ever sailed before?" he asked. Wait, that was a dumb question. Yulishees lived underwater. Why would they need a ship?

"No, I haven't actually," Cienna answered. "I've always wondered it was like, though, to travel over the water rather than through it." The yulishee gestured to the mast and the rigging. "It seems quite a bit more complicated than I imagined."

Matthias took a quick look around. Harper and Samuel were nowhere to be seen. Probably still working with the captain. He turned back to Cienna.

"Well, I could show you around and stuff. You know, if you don't mind or whatever."

Cienna's face brightened. "I wouldn't mind at all. Do you know much about sailing?"

He shrugged again. "Not all that much. But I know a little, from what I learned from Harper and Samuel and the bosun. I could at least show you around the ship."

"That would be... cool. Did I use that right?"

"Yup."

"All right." Cienna turned to look over at his parents and Miss Reverie and Mister Kilik. They were _still_ all talking. Sheesh. "We'd better get out of view otherwise Reverie's going to remember that we have to get work."

He grinned. "Okay. Let's go below decks."

* * *

Together they explored the galleon's interior. Matthias pointed out all the interesting features—well the ones he knew about anyway—and cool places.

Just not the bilge area. Because that was just yuck.

But he ran out of things to look at below, so he took Cienna back up top to kinda-sorta explain the sailing.

"Oh, so if the ship uses wind to push it along, they can't sail towards the wind can they? What do they do? Do they just anchor and wait for the wind to shift?"

"Not really? They just sail in a zigzag, kind of towards the wind, but not really. So they can sail into the wind, but it takes time. Uh... they call it tacking."

"Fascinating," Cienna said as she looked up at the sails, and the yulishee actually looked totally interested. "Do the shape of the sails—"

"Cienna!" he heard Miss Reverie's voice call, interrupting Cienna. Aw. He had wanted to hear the question, so he could answer or whatever. "It's time for the ships to begin moving again! Over the side!"

Miss Reverie, spear in hand, gave a final wave to Mother, Father, and Mister Kilik, then walked to the edge of the ship and jumped over.

Cienna turned back to look at him and also gave a wave of her own. "I had better go. I'm only a trainee water mage, so I have to observe the other water mages as they move the ship. I'll perhaps see you tonight, since we'll sleep aboard the ship."

"Okay. Um. I'll show you more of the ship then, if you want."

Cienna smiled. "That would be nice. Goodbye."

"Bye."

He watched Cienna walk over to his parents and the president, probably to say goodbye. When Cienna came back he would probably show her the—

"Well, she is quite a pretty girl, Master Matthias," a voice said from behind him.

He jumped about half a foot into the air before whirling around to find Sir Davien. The knight was smiling at him, with a little gleam in his blue eyes that he always saw in Mother's and Father's whenever they laughed.

The surprise wore off, only for Sir Davien's words to register. His cheeks felt hot.

He crossed his arms over his chest. "She's a little pretty," he said to the knight.

Sir Davien didn't say anything else, just kept on smiling. He started when he heard another splash and noticed Cienna was gone. Must've gone back into the water, too.

"Don't worry. She mentioned she would be back."

He pursed his lips and frowned. Mother usually scolded him when he made this face, but Sir Davien wasn't mother. Humph.

The knight laughed. "Well, I'd better distract you then, Master Matthias. You remember the swords your father purchased in Enhambre?"

He nodded. "The ones Mother got mad at him for buying?"

"Oh, no, your mother wasn't too cross with him for that. But yes, those swords. Now that we have some training blades, would some sword training sound cool to you?"

Oh! That sounded awesome. "Yeah! That would be totally cool!"

"All right!"

* * *

Tlalocan had changed quite a bit from the last time she'd seen it, at least from her vantage point on the docked _Hildegard_.

Ellis waited for the gankplank to be secured and for Captain Yshae and the two midshipman to go down to the pier. She saw the captain meet and shake hands with an older gentleman at the wharf, most likely the harbormaster.

According the Kilik, they'd spend a day here to stretch their legs while the _Hildegard_, _Star of Nillea_, and _Fortuitous Winds_ restocked. After that they would move to the south of Fendias to the city of Lus Soleil, to unload and load some additional cargo.

According to Yshae, they'd made the journey from Enhambre to Fendias in only fourteen days with the help of the yulishees, as opposed to the normal twenty days. The captain had theorized they could have gone even faster if they had continued using their magic at night, but yulishees needed rest and had night vision no better than a human, so they came aboard the ships at dark to sleep.

Still, nearly a week of saved time was fantastic. Kilik had seemed particularly impressed with the time they'd made. For all his talk about not caring about the economic aspect of his business, the former pirate really did seem enthused about their speed.

"Count, Countess, you may go down now, if you like," the bosun said to her and Rex. She stepped forward... then stopped. Her husband's machismo would undoubtedly be dealt a harsh blow if the wife went by herself only to fall to her doom.

The walkway was only about a foot and a half wide, so not quite enough to accommodate her and Rex side by side. She let Rex go first, where her husband reached back to offer a hand to her. She rolled her eyes playfully in response to his crooked grin. Rex led her down the walkway, with Matty craning his neck every step her took behind her to get an eyeful of the city. Further back would be Davien and the other knights

They reached the pier to find a finely dressed, somewhat portly man waiting patiently next to a pair of large, shrouded palanquin and its carriers. There was a crest on the man's shoulder that she didn't recognize. Looked familiar, though. Hmm. Where had she seen it before? Whoever it belonged to, it was obvious that this was an orderly or courtier of some noble house in the city.

The man gave her and Rex a polite bow. "Count and Countess Roaring Cove?" the man asked.

"Yes, we are," Rex answered. "What can we do for you?"

The man stumbled on his words for a moment. A count asking what he could do for a messenger was perhaps a bit unusual for those who did the full-time nobility thing. "Er. Milord, I have been asked by my lord to convey you to a meeting."

She frowned. That was a bit... forward. The man hadn't even given his patron's name.

She caught Rex's eye, and knew the same thing had gone through her husband's mind.

"You can tell your master that we will gladly meet him," she said to the courtier. "We would just like to know who has provided such a warm welcome for us."

The man bowed politely. "Milord, milady, you will meet her soon enough. Please, I beseech you to—"

"We are more than happy to wait for the information," Rex cut in, firmly.

The attendant spluttered. "Count, countess! I beg you—"

"Votel, that's enough, thank you" a voice said from inside the closest litter, which was quite apparently occupied.

The courtier jerked at the command and stepped aside, bowing.

A hand brushed aside the curtains, and out stepped a woman.

Average height, but slender, with brown hair and matching eyes. Despite her slimness and the fancy, frilly clothing, Ellis could see that she had compact, athletic build. The noble's face wasn't exactly beautiful, but striking in its own way. The set of her jaw gave the impression that this woman wasn't one of those delicate, pampered court flowers.

Ellis had never met a noble like her before, so why did this woman seem so familiar?

Beside her, her husband started chuckling. Huh. Did Rex know something she didn't?

"You look good in those clothes, don't get me wrong," Rex said to the noble. "But... I don't know. They somehow don't seem _you_, Beatrice."

She did a double take. Oh, gods, Rex was right! It _was_ Beatrice! Aged a little, but now that Rex mentioned, she _saw_ it.

"Oh, Rex, you have no idea how I wish I could wear normal clothing for once," Beatrice snorted as the younger woman gave them both a hug. "I can barely walk in heels."

"Well, if you do trip," Ellis said, "at least your shinobi training would mean you would fall gracefully."

"Hah! Ninja techniques are amazing, but they can't work miracles."

They laughed at that.

"So, why the mysteriousness?" Rex asked.

"It's normally how things are done when the consul wishes for an audience with someone," Beatrice explained. Consul? Hmm? "Usually people would instantly recognize the crest of the ruling consul, but I guess my father didn't realize that you'd never seen it before.

Oh, that was right! Beatrice's father was Ryune, the consul of Tlalocan. She'd never met the men, but she recognized the name.

"Ah, that explains the clothes," she said.

"Yes, it does," Beatrice answered with a sigh. "The daughter of a consul is the closest Tlalocan has to a princess, so this." She watched the other woman gesture to her clothes. "And since I don't have an excuse to go overseas to fight demons and dark gods, I'm here worrying about protocol and which noble to talk to and whatever." Beatrice fingered her dress. "It's not entirely bad. I mean, it's nice to have such beautiful clothing and being able to look... pretty every once in a while. It's just that the rest of it drives me up the wall."

"Speaking of consuls and semi-royalty, how is your grandfather doing? I haven't seen Alberti in ages," she heard her husband ask. They all ignored the faint choking sound Votel made. Maybe hearing a count and countess being so casual with what amounted to a crown princess and a former king—well, technically king consort, if you wanted to nitpick—was perhaps a bit too much for him.

"He's doing perfectly fine. In fact..." Beatrice turned back to the litter and poked her head inside. "Grandfather! Please come, they want to—Grandfather?"

The brunette stopped, head still stuck inside the curtains. A moment later Beatrice withdrew. The younger woman was rubbing her temple with her hand, as if trying to ward off a migraine.

"Oh, he's doing it again, isn't he?" Beatrice said with a sigh.

"You act as if it's a surprise," a gruff voice said from behind her and Rex. "You know I hate being cooped up in one of those things."

Now _this_ gravely voice she recognized. "Watching our backs as usual, Alberti?" she asked over her shoulder. She and Rex turned slightly to get a look at another old friend.

Alberti hadn't changed much, at least compared to Beatrice. Beatrice still looked fit and youthful for a woman in her early thirties, but she could still see the signs of aging that was the simple fact of life for a normal human like Beatrice. Alberti had been pushing sixty during their battle against Summerill and Chaos, but had kept in such fine shape that the former royal guard had been in better condition than most men half his age.

Alberti still looked in excellent condition... for his age, which was only a few years off of seventy. The wrinkles on his face were more pronounced, and the skin around his forearms and face was much less firm than what she had remembered. Telling, too, was the white that was making Alberti's pale blond hair seem even paler.

Despite that, the man's blue eyes still had their alert sharpness, and Alberti still filled out fur-lined jacket well.

"I had to do it for four decades," Alberti laughed, walking around to stand next to Beatrice. She saw the older man still moved well despite his years. "Well, only two in Rex's case. Why should it be any different?"

"Your rewards for that weren't clothes, it seems," she heard Rex joke, motioning to Alberti. The jacket the older man was wearing was probably the same one he'd purchased in Enhambre, and the camouflaged trousers didn't look much newer.

"Heh," she heard Alberti chuckle. "I'm just as uncomfortable with consular trappings as my granddaughter is. However, Beatrice was at least born into the life. Me? I was just a mere royal guard who the consul's daughter seemed to like."

She smiled. Alberti had forsaken the privilege and rank he'd had as the commander of Tlalocan's royal guard and risked life and limb to save Nastassja, the daughter of then-consul Midas. The love the two had for each other was actually a standard she strove for in her marriage to Rex. So far, she thought she and Rex were managing just fine.

"Well, thank goodness for that. Imagine if Grandmother hadn't liked you," Beatrice said in a deadpan.

"Well, your father would have been terribly angry about that, I think," Alberti replied, in the same tone.

They shared a chuckle at that.

"And speaking of fathers," Alberti continued. "We received your letter you sent all those years back. Belated congratulations, and apologies for not being able to come by to visit. Is this the boy?"

She smiled. "Yes. Beatrice and Alberti, this is our son Matthias."

* * *

So this was Matthias' first time to meet a princess. It was pretty cool.

Well, Mother said Lady Beatrice wasn't technically a princess, but she looked princess-y. So he was going to call her Lady Beatrice since it seemed like it was the right thing to do.

Mister Alberti had told him not to call him "Lord Alberti," though. It kind of made sense, since Mister Alberti didn't look like a king—well, "technically not a king," Mother had said—but rather looked more like Sir Davien. Well, if Sir Davien was older, blond, and wore less armor.

They seemed really cool though.

They talked a little more—like adults always did, ick—until Miss Murmina, Vashtor, Miss Reverie, Fer, Qua, and Cienna also appeared. It looked like Lady Beatrice and Mister Alberti knew them, too, except for Cienna.

And then more talking. Argh.

He quietly stepped over to Cienna and gently tapped her on the shoulder. Sir Davien said that that wasn't a polite way to get a lady's attention, but Cienna was only a girl and he was desperate to get out of this.

Cienna turned her head and gave him a questioning look. He pointed to the side, where he could see an exit from the dock area into the city. Cienna looked to where he was pointed, then nodded slowly.

When Mother and Father weren't looking, he grabbed Cienna's hand and quietly went off towards the gate.

"I'm sure my father wouldn't mind hosting the rest of you for a night," Rex heard Beatrice say.

"He doesn't have to," Murmina said.

He watched Beatrice smile. "I _want_ to, though. You're all dear friends of mine. Not to speak ill of Kilik's ships, but I hope some palatial rooms are more comfortable than the cabins you have on the galleon.

"Honestly, a floor that isn't rocking constantly would be more than enough for me," he said. "I don't know how Ellis stands it."

"That's because I'm not a baby, sweetheart," his wife teased.

"Well, technically, I kind of am. I'm a quarter of your age, you know," he poked back. "At least I'm fortunate that I got to you first. Who knows. You might have found some handsome pirate somewhere and enjoyed atrociously bobbing floors to your heart's content."

Ellis responded with a huff and a playful poke to his side with her elbow.

Alberti cleared his throat. Oops. He and Ellis were doing it again.

"Well, there's a lot of things I'm sure we all want to speak about," Beatrice said. "But we can do that at my residence over a good meal."

"Which is going to take some figuring out, I think," he heard Alberti add, pointing with his chin at the two litters.

Right. No offense to the bearers, but Rex highly doubted that they could carry ten people, especially people with the physiques of Davien and Vashtor.

"Hrm," he said. "How far is it from here?"

"About two and a half miles, Rex," Beatrice answered. "I could send a runner to get some litters, maybe."

"Personally, I'm fine with walking," he said. He looked towards Ellis, who nodded.

"But you all must be exhausted from the voyage," Alberti said.

"We've been cooped up on a ship for two _weeks_," Murmina said. "Walking sounds _fantastic_."

Beatrice shrugged. "Well, that's good enough for me. However..."

The brunette bent down and removed her heels. She went back to her litter, tossed the shoes inside, reached in, and withdrew a pair of worn but practical sandals.

"Okay, shall we?"

He carefully didn't stare at poor Votel, who looked flummoxed by Beatrice not only speaking to those of lower status so openly, not only inviting them all to the consular palace, not only offering to _walk_ with them, but also for changing out her ornate shoes for something so passe as comfortable footwear.

Heh. At least and Ellis weren't the only ones who had trouble adjusting to a noble lifestyle.

Well, time to go. Better get Matthias moving before the boy—

Matty?

* * *

"So they hit the metal when it's hot because...?" Matthias heard Cienna ask him.

"Because when it's glowing its softer," he explained as the blacksmith hammered. He looked over to the side of the open smithy, where a man, smaller than the blacksmith, was bent over a sickle blade, rubbing the metal. The man's lips were moving, but he couldn't hear what was being said.

He pointed to the other man. "Although, I don't know what that's about," he admitted.

"Oh, I think he's working some kind of enchantment into the metal," Cienna said. "I can feel the magic, faintly."

His eyes widened. "You can sense magic that easily?"

"Well, I'm training to be a water mage, silly," Cienna said with a laugh. "Reverie says I'm particularly sensitive to detecting magic, and Reverie is a very strong mage herself."

"Wow, that's really cool," he said, continuing to watch the human mage work. "Can you tell what he's doing?"

The yulishee shook her head. "I can't. Well. I can sense that it's earth magic that he's using, but that's about it. I still need more training and practice."

"Well, it's still really cool," he said, grinning.

Cienna looked embarrassed for a second, then slowly grinned back.

After getting bored they headed away from the smithy, wandering through the street and making sure not to get stepped on by horses. That would be bad.

He felt Cienna tug on his sleeve. Hmm? He turned to look at the shop the girl was pointing at.

"Yeah?"

"I sense magic coming from that store. Quite a bit of it. What is it?"

He read the sign. It was a name he couldn't pronounce.

"Hmm," he said. "I don't know. Let's go look!" He ran across the street, towards the shop. He looked through as Cienna caught up with him. Hmm. The glass was kind of dirty, so it was tough to see, but he saw lots of shelves around the store, all of them holding stuff. Umm. He saw a jar with... were those eyeballs?

Oh, he knew what is was.

He spoke slowly, because the word was tricky. "It's an... apothecary. They collect plants and monster parts and stuff and sell them to mages or herbalists."

"Oh, so I suppose that's why I'm sensing such strong magic from this place."

He peeled his face away from the glass. "Yup. There's a lot of magic items in the... apothecary, plus the people who shop there are usually mages. And I guess the owners would be too, huh?"

"It would make sense," Cienna said, also looking into the window. The yulishee backed away and looked around. "What else can we look at? I never knew city life held so much."

This was kind of weird. He was the one usually asking tons and tons of questions, not person being asked.

"Uh... I don't know really. I've never been to Till. Tla." He frowned and concentrated on the word. "_Tlalocan_." Some of these cities outside of Aegisthus had weird names. Maybe if he ever practiced talking a lot like the adults did he might not have problems with it.

"Oh, I see," Cienna said. "Perhaps... that way?" Cienna pointed deeper into the city.

"Okay, that sounds good. I think there might be clothing and general shops that way."

They started moving in that direction. It started to get more crowded, with people bumping into him or Cienna often.

Father always said he was big for—oof!—his age, but people who were normal sized for their age was still bigger than he was. Cienna was taller than him, so people saw her and usually avoided running into her, but she was still getting hit every once in a while. He tried to stay in front of her to block. Father sometimes did that for Mother when they had went to Centan on a holiday, and the streets were even more crowded. And even if Cienna was only a girl, she was older than he was, so she was close enough to a lady. Or something.

He managed to bull his way through the street, and found himself in what looked like a town square. Except it would be a city square, right?

But at least the huge crush of people was gone. Phew. He rested against the edge of a fountain.

"My goodness!" Cienna said with a laugh as she rested her hands on her knees. "Are the surface cities always this busy?"

He shrugged. "Some of them. When I was growing up the closest city was Centan, and it was usually pretty quiet except during celebrations. Uh... Nillea seemed pretty quiet, too, but it's a lot smaller than Til... Tlalocan."

"So you're not used to this, either?"

He shrugged again. "Kind of. I mean we visited Centan a couple of times a month, I think, and lots of time it was during some event."

"I see," Cienna said, leaning over the fountain. "Excuse me."

He watched the yulishee splash some water over her face and hair, then run her wet hands over her arms.

"Sorry," she said to him. "My skin felt a little dry."

The water made her hair glisten prettily.

He suddenly felt shy again. Um. Talk. Talking was the answer.

"Cienna, how come you follow Reverie around. Well except for now, I mean."

"She's my colom leader," the Cienna answered. "I wanted to see the world, so I joined her."

"Oh," he said. "Did your parents mind that?"

"Not quite. They wanted to keep me in their colom and grow up to be a proper yulishee lady. It probably would have happened had I not met Reverie several years ago. She told me of the surface world, especially the cities of the humans, and I became curious about it. Two years ago, when I was twelve, Reverie petitioned the leader of my colom to allow me to become a member of her's."

"So you joined her colom after that?"

"Yes."

"Cool. How many of you are there?"

Cienna chuckled. "Including Reverie and myself? Two."

He blinked. "Wait, really?"

"Yes. I suppose Reverie's wanderlust and interest in the outside world was just a bit too strange for most other yulishees." The girl laughed again. "I suppose I'm just a bit too strange, myself."

"Well, then that would make us both strange too," he said. "I think sometimes Mother and Father get annoyed because I forget the time while I'm exploring... things..."

Oh, hold on.

"Matthias?"

"I just kind of remembered that we've been gone for a while. I know the adults love to talk, but they can't talk _that_ long, you know. Uh. Maybe we'd better get back to the harbor."

"We probably should," Cienna said, suddenly looking a bit worried. "But..." He saw the yulishee looking over at the packed streets. Going back through that again wouldn't be fun, oh no it wouldn't.

Hmm. "Maybe we could try cutting through the smaller streets and alleys," he suggested, pointing.

"And that will get us back to the ships?" Cienna asked. She didn't sound sure.

"Maybe?" he said. He wasn't sure, actually. "If we go down that way and just head back the way we came, kind of, I think we're going to reach the harbor." He thought for a second. "I hope."

Cienna looked thoughtful. "Well, I suppose that makes sense. Of course, we could end up going in the completely opposite direction and getting hopelessly lost."

"Well, yeah. But even if we get lost, we'll probably see more cool stuff. It's a win either way!"

Cienna just smiled.

* * *

Rex frowned. "You know, I love my son as any father does, but when I find Matthias he's going on a leash. _A_ _literal_ _leash._ Ten feet at most. With the other end wrapped around my waist or Ellis'."

Was he a little annoyed with the situation? Eh. Maybe a little.

"I wonder where he gets it from?" he heard Alberti ask. "I remember you being almost painfully obedient to Ellis and Plum." The older man laughed. "Except when you weren't. Then you had your troublemaking streaks, too. Might have gotten it from your grandfather."

"Why couldn't it have skipped his generation?" he mused.

They'd split off into pairs and were looking through the city. Problem was, Tlalocan was one of the larger Fendiasi cities, so this was going to a while.

Humph. _Five_ foot leash.

* * *

Whoa, that was weird. Matthias had felt the hairs on the back of his neck prickle up a bit. Mother said that was a sign that someone was talking about you.

But he had other things to worry about. Like being hopelessly lost.

"I think we've seen this inn before," Cienna said, pointing.

"Can't be," he replied. "We'd have to make, like, three lefts or three rights to get to the spot, and I know we only did two lefts."

The girl's brow crinkled as she thought. "True, but I think we made _four_ rights. Wouldn't that bring us back to the same spot?"

He imagined a drawing in his head. It would, wouldn't it? Then again...

"But I don't remember that store myself," he said.

"Fifteen minutes ago you were explaining to me what ice cream was when we saw that eatery," Cienna told him. "Maybe I noticed this inn and you didn't?"

"But then, where's the eatery?"

Cienna blinked. "Good point."

They continued meandering around Tlalocan, still completely lost.

"Maybe we should ask someone, Matthias," Cienna suggested after another ten minutes.

"Maybe we should," he replied. He looked around. About five minutes ago they'd entered a quieter part of the city. In fact, he could only see a handful of people on the street.

"Let's ask him," the girl said, breaking away from him and moving towards a poorly-dressed, dirty man near the corner. Oh. A beggar. He was going to tell Cienna that no, stop, maybe asking a homeless man wouldn't be the best idea, but the yulishee was already close.

"Excuse me, sir?" Cienna asked the homeless man. "Could you please point us towards the harbor. We're lost."

The beggar looked up. Unless the man was born with different colored eyes, and one of them was a very pale color, he was blind on one eye. "Eh, what was that? I ain't got the hearing I used to have, so you gotta speak up, little missy."

"Sorry," Cienna said, a little more loudly. "We're lost and we'd like to know how to get back to the harbor."

"Sure thing," the beggar said. The man gave them the directions.

Oh, they'd take one too many rights and shouldn't even have gone left until the second right. Darn. He thought he'd remembered it right...

"Thank you!" Cienna said brightly, smiling.

He suddenly felt bad. The poor man had given them nice help, but he didn't have any money on him. If he had, it probably would have been gone because he would have bought Cienna ice cream, anyway.

"I'm sorry," he apologized. "We don't have any money or anything.

The homeless man didn't look disappointed or mad or anything. "Oh, don't worry about it, young sir. It's such a rare occasion that anyone talks to old, lame, half-blind Brennan, so having a pretty young lady like the miss here speak to me is plenty enough."

He still felt bad, but okay. "Okay then, Mister Brennan," he said to the beggar. "Thanks for the help."

"Hah! 'Mister' Brennan! Haven't heard that in years. Thank you kindly for that. But best be off on your way, lad and missy."

"Okay, goodbye."

* * *

Matthias and Cienna were almost there when they ran into Fer and Qua.

"Oh, I don't envy being you right now," the nelth said to him.

"Huh? Why?"

"Your parents seemed quite mad.

"Veeeeery mad," Qua added.

* * *

Rex was glad he'd never experienced Ellis' angry side. Like Alberti had mentioned earlier, he'd had his disobedient streaks when he'd been a kid. However, he'd never been subjected to what poor Matty was experiencing right now.

To be fair, this wasn't _really_ Ellis' anger, not really. He'd seen that when they'd faced Summerill, and later, the dark gods. What he was seeing right now was just a mother expressing her worry and fear to her son. Not too far off, he could hear Reverie giving Cienna a similar lecture, though maybe one with a little less heat than Ellis'.

Matty, to his credit, looked genuinely contrite about the whole thing. Rex didn't doubt it. Yes, Matthias did drive them nuts every once in a while, but that was just because of the boy's energy and curiousness, with maybe a little bit of immaturity. He was willing to bet that if Matthias took the time to think and realized that wandering off into a strange city was going to drive him and Ellis sick with worry, the boy wouldn't think to leave their sides.

And yet, he was still considering a leash, gods help him.

He noticed that Ellis had finished, and had taken a step back from their son. His wife probably expected him to say something. Ugh. He was better just looking disappointed with Matthias, not actually saying anything. He was a terrible... scolder. Was that even a word?

Eh.

"Matthias," he said to the boy, "you have to understand that you're the most important thing to the two of us. Like your mother said, we get _scared_ when you disappear without us knowing, _especially_ in a new city. And to top it off, why did you go off, anyway? You heard us. We were going to go by foot through the city. You'd have plenty of time to look around as we traveled through."

Matthias had his eyes glued to the ground. Normally his son was good with being polite and making eye contact, but he guessed being scolded by both Mother and Father was just a bit too much.

"Sorry," he heard Matty say quietly. I would have waited, honestly. But grown ups talk for forever."

Despite himself, he snorted. Without really thinking about it, he glanced over at Ellis, who was looking at him with an eyebrow cocked. Oh boy.

"Well, I'll give you that, Matty," he said to his son. "Adults do talk a lot. Your mother knows. I sometimes got bored out of my skull, too."

Ellis' expression changed to one of monumental disappointment. "You, know, sweetheart, you're not supposed to encourage him."

"But I'm not!" he protested. "I'm not approving of slipping off like that. I'm just saying I understand. Because, seriously, when I was Matthias' age, all of you talked way too much. And then six or seven years later, I was doing the same thing."

"I'll be doing that in six years?" Matty asked, eyes wide.

"I talked too much?" Ellis asked at the same time.

Um. Ignore. Ignore!

"The point is, Matthias Raglan," he said seriously, "is that you mean the world to your mother and I. Think about what it's like for us when you disappear like that in a city we're not familiar with. Something could have happened to you, and that is something that scares us. Okay? Just think about this whenever you decide to go off somewhere. Think about where and when, and with who, and if you're going to let us know. Are we clear?"

Matthias briefly lifted his head and made eye contact, before looking back at the ground. "Yes, sir. I'm sorry."

He had made sure not to word it so as to completely dampen Matthias explorative nature. He just wanted to make Matty a little more... thoughtful. He made eye contact with Ellis, and he saw his wife smile slightly. They'd been married for a little more than ten years. They knew how the other ticked.

And he knew he was going to pay for the "talking too much" statement later. Heh.

"Well, Matthias, your father said the rest of what needed to be said, so we can stop it here," he heard Ellis say. "Just know that we get angry like this because we're scared for you. We don't want anything to happen to you. Understood?"

Matthias looked up, and their son actually smiled weakly. "Yes, ma'am."

Beside him, his wife took a breath and let it out. He could almost see the stress and anger leave her system.

"Well, with that out of the way," Ellis said, "we'd better start making our way towards the consular building." He watched his wife pat Matthias on the head. "And since you've seen the city already, maybe you could be our tour guide."

"Oh!" Matthias said suddenly, eyes wide. "I almost forgot! Could we make, er, a detour somewhere? And could I borrow some coin, Mother?"

Huh?

* * *

Ellis had to admit, Matthias hadn't been exaggerating about how crowded the main boulevards were. Oof.

After Matthias gave a quick recounting of their meeting with the beggar Brennan, and telling Alberti about the directions—she was impressed that Matty had been able to recite them in reverse so easily—they'd decided to split up on their way to the consular home. Matthias seemed insistent on giving the homeless man some kind of reward for the help. She couldn't rightly disagree with it. After all, without those directions Matthias and Cienna might still be wandering around, lost, and she and Rex would be dealing with heightened blood pressure. Gods. She was only one hundred and thirteen, far too young a high elf to be worrying about things like that.

However, as luck would have it, the location where Matty said the beggar was significantly out of the way. At Beatrice's suggestion, she, Rex, Matthias, Alberti, and Cienna had broken off from the main group, along with the ever-present Davien and the knights. The two children would lead them to the spot, and Alberti could guide them to the consular building afterward.

Cienna had tagged along since she also wanted to thank the Brennan fellow, and Reverie was busy. The older yulishee had to arrange for the housing of the water mages during the night, and the negotiations would take an hour or so, even with Kilik's help. Reverie wasn't their colom leader, of course, but in the context of their employment to Enhambre Transoceanic she was basically the manager.

For Ellis' part, she'd considered just letting Rex go with Alberti and the kids. She was still a smidgen upset with Matthias' sneaking off, so she wanted a little time to cool off a bit. Which made her sound like a harassed old woman, but whatever.

Then Matthias had mentioned an ice cream parlor.

She sighed to herself.

If there was a food that she had a soft spot for, it was ice cream. She'd harbored that particular weakness ever since Leo introduced it to her at Chalcis, back in Lucrellia. Her home continent of the past ten years, Aegisthus, was hot and generally arid, so gelato was extremely rare and expensive. To top that off, during their short stay at Enhambre, she'd made the misery-inducing discovery that the hot and humid climate of the island region wasn't exactly conducive to the ice cream market.

So she'd almost been embarrassingly eager to get some ice cream. This kind of thing was going to make her fat.

Ugh. Too young to be thinking like this!

She was jerked out of her thoughts when Matthias stopped in front of them suddenly.

"Matty, what's wrong?" she asked.

"Well, Mister Brennan's over there," her son replied, pointing. "I don't know who the others are, though."

She looked to where Matthias was indicating. She could see a poorly dressed man sitting near the corner, with what looked like three youths surrounding him in a semicircle.

She might make jokes about her age, but it didn't change the fact that she had over a century's worth of experience living life, and that included socializing with people. And that experience was telling her that Brennan didn't know those three.

And by the youths' aggressive body language, she could tell that they weren't meeting the homeless man for charitable reasons.

Almost without thinking she reached out and pulled Matthias closer to her. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Rex studying her. After a moment her husband started walking towards the four men, followed closely by Alberti.

Her first impulse was to hang back with Matthias and let the two men handle this. But no. She couldn't coddle Matty, not even as a panic reaction to her worry during her son's disappearance earlier. Matthias had to learn about the world, and not just what she, Rex, and Davien could teach.

Gently gripping her son on the shoulder, she followed her husband, staying a few paces behind. Cienna stayed near them. To her surprise, Sir Davien and the two other knights hung far back.

"Good afternoon, gentleman," she heard her husband call out to the four. The three young men had been so caught up with saying something to the beggar—she hadn't caught what was being said—that the greeting caught them by surprise. "Would one of you happen to be Brennan?"

The three strangers wheeled on Rex. The looked to be around seventeen or eighteen, and the largest of them was actually taller and broader than her husband.

Of the Raglans she had grown up with, Rex was the smallest after Duran, and it could be argued that Duran hadn't finished growing when he'd given his life to seal the Enhambrean spire. But, in any case, her husband didn't strike a particularly imposing figure... when he didn't want to. And right now Rex was trying to be as disarmingly innocuous as possible. Her husband had always been good at controlling his own body language and tone of voice. Hopefully that would resolve whatever the situation was.

But why, oh why, did she not think so?

"Brennan's my name, good sir," the beggar answered, starting to rise from his sitting position. "Good day to—"

Ellis gasped when the largest youth savagely kicked the old man in the ribs, tumbling Brennan back to the street and bashing his arm against the ground. She saw Rex's right hand twitch slightly.

"Shut up, you old street rat," the larger boy spat at the old man. Then, turning to her husband, "Get out of here. You've got no business with filthy old Brennan."

"I think I know enough about myself to know whether I have business of not," she heard Rex say, still speaking in a neutrally friendly tone. Her husband directed his attention to the wheezing old man. "I'd like to thank you for helping my son and his friend a little while back. It was very kind of you."

Brennan looked confused, as did the youths. The beggar might be stunned from the blow and wasn't tracking well. The three bullies didn't know how to deal with someone who just ignored them.

She saw Rex turn slightly and nod to her. Right.

She walked forward, nudging Matthias along.

"Don't say anything to those three," she said quietly to Matthias. "Your father and I will deal with this. Same goes for you Cienna, if you please."

"Okay," Matty whispered.

"Yes, ma'am," Cienna added.

When Brennan caught sight of her son and the yulishee girl, Ellis saw recognition in the beggar's eyes. "Little sir and little missy! Old Brennan remembers you two! Found your way back, did you?"

"Yes, Mister Brennan," Matthias answered.

The beggar was going to say something more, but the large youth cut him off. Ellis saw him motion at Matthias with his chin. "That your boy?"

Rex nodded. "He is."

"What's with his ears?"

"Among other things, he's half high elf," she heard her husband answer.

Technically, Matthias was nine-sixteenths high elf, but that really didn't matter. What mattered was that eyes of the trio narrowed their eyes with such naked hatred and disgusted that she almost pulled Matthias and Cienna behind her to shield them.

"So you plowed a pointy-ears, did you?" one of the smaller youths spat. "What? One of your own kind wasn't good enough for you?

A small part of her mind made a mental retort that Rex wasn't as human as he looked, despite having the outward appearance of a completely normal human being.

A slightly larger portion noticed Rex's hand clenching into a fist briefly before opening again.

The majority of her mind was concentrating on keeping her jaw from dropping open at the sheer rudeness and vitriol of that... accusation.

"That—" her husband started to say.

"What're you doing, rutting with a pointy-ears, huh?" the largest youth snapped. "Think that's your ticket into Lus Soleil? Making a half-breed freak?" The boy locked eyes onto her. "Is that her, your elf bitch?"

She heard Cienna gasp.

She saw Rex's right hand—his sword hand—clench tightly into a fist, quivering.

She wasn't bothered by what was being said. Well, no. She was quite thoroughly offended by those words. _Incredibly_ offended. But she'd heard worse. Had worse. Gods, she'd almost been _killed_, in Lucrellia, for the simple sin of _being_ a high elf. Sticks and stones and warhammers could break bones, but words from a bigot with more size than sense would never hurt her.

But she was worried. Rex was very good at controlling his body language, which was one aspect that made him such a good leader. But she knew, after so many years of being with Rex, about one thing that her husband didn't seem to control very well.

Rex got angry just like any other person, even with his excellent self control. She remembered clearly the time in Enhambre when an anxious Rex had yelled at Fer and Qua. But there were a few times she had seen her husband's anger become something else. It was something she hadn't seen with the other Raglans.

It was an anger that was so total and primal and focused that it ceased being simple anger. It was utter rage. A rage that had ended _gods_.

The twitching in Rex's hands, that fist he was making, were signs that her husband didn't—or couldn't—control. And with his sword hand balled up like that, she knew that Rex wasn't angry yet, not even now. But that fist was a sign her husband was close to allowing himself to get angered, and what followed after that could turn... unpleasant.

She had to intervene. But how? The three bigots would just spew something else offensive to her, and that would only serve to stoke Rex's fury. Perhaps, with her magic, she could—

Alberti stepped forward, into the three youths' faces, forcing them to take a step back. Even at his age, the older, taller, stockier man cut a much more imposing figure than her husband did.

"Listen, you three," she heard Alberti growl. "The Count and Countess here are very polite, patient people. Why don't you three quit while you're ahead and leave? Now."

The large youth sneered. "Who're you to tell us—"

"Shut up," Alberti snapped, "and leave. Your rudeness is starting to annoy me."

The boy stared at the older man.

Then he threw a brutal punch into Alberti's jaw.

Or it would have ended up in Alberti's face had not the older man stepped forward into the punch, robbing it of momentum and arresting what energy it had with a defensive block.

"You _would_ hit an old man, wouldn't you?" she heard Alberti sigh. With a quick, powerful movement, Alberti sent the large youth stumbling backwards. The two other young men stared, eyes wide with shock.

"Let's just let it end here," Rex told the youths. "This doesn't need to go any further."

Another of the youths—the one that hadn't spoken yet—bounded forward and threw a punch at her husband's face. The boy was faster than the first, that much she could tell.

It didn't mean much. She had seen her husband in combat, and he was lightning quick. She watched her husband sidestep, grabbing the boy's wrist on the follow through. Rex pulled slightly, upsetting, the youth's balance.

Then she saw Rex's fingers squeeze.

She swore she heard a creaking noise. The youth let out a surprised yelp and collapsed to his knees on the street, futilely trying to tug his arm out of her husband's grip.

Her husband didn't look it, but he was also incredibly strong. Whether that was because of Rex's diverse lineage or the power of the Spirit Vessel—or, most likely, a combination of the two—her husband had enough strength that even a gurg like Vashtor couldn't simply overpower him. Yes, Vashtor was stronger, but the pale man was for all intents and purposes a demigod who was probably close to double Rex's weight and significantly taller. She'd seen the two of them sparring before. Monstrously strong as Vashtor was, the gurg wasn't strong enough to simply brute force his way through Rex.

Almost felt sorry for that arm. Almost.

The last youth made a half-hearted towards her husband. Almost without thinking, she raised a palm towards the boy, calling her light magic forth. Her hand blazed with white, luminous energy.

It was completely harmless, a variation of her illumination spells. However, to those who weren't familiar with magic, and light magic in particular, it looked positively menacing. The youth stopped in his tracks. Out of the corner of her eye she saw her husband release the boy he'd been restraining.

"Please, just leave," she said softly. "This is getting us nowhere, most of all yourselves. Imagine what you could be doing instead of beating on an old beggar and starting fights with a high elf. Imagine what you could make of yourselves if you didn't waste your energy on hate."

She'd said that without really thinking about it. Why? Hmm. Perhaps it was because, after that flash of indignation and anger, she'd felt pity and sadness for these three boys.

The three youths hastily departed. The first two, the largest and the one that had tried to wallop Rex, glared venomous daggers at her and her family. The last, the boy she'd dazzled with her magic, looked unsure, and when he looked at her, she felt less animosity radiating from him.

Maybe in the near future that youth would give up on his racism and adopt a more positive outlook. Who knew. If he did, she'd daresay this little bit of unpleasantness was worth it.

She felt tired. She'd grown up with hate. Hate directed at her, or at the world, or at her friends, or at entire peoples. She was frankly sick of it. Rex and his ancestors had given Agarest freedom. Why waste it by choosing to hate?

She watched Rex and Alberti reach down and gently haul Brennan back into a seated position.

"We're sorry for what happened," she heard Rex say to the old man.

"Eh, stuff like that happens to me. I've learned to deal with it."

"Was there a reason they were harassing you?" Alberti asked.

Brennan nodded slowly. "I wasn't always this old or this crippled, good sir. At one time I was a woodsman living in the woods not too far from the high elf city of Lus Soleil." She saw Brennan's good eye lose focus slightly, as if the beggar was seeing something off in the far distance. "A high elf girl and I met. We fell in love. And as soon as the relationship started, it ended. I don't know if she had second thoughts with being with a human, or if her family didn't want her consorting with me. Was never sure. Maybe I was a coward for never seeking her out to get an answer. I moved north, to Tlalocan. Maybe to forget about her. A logging accident shattered a leg and blinded an eye, and here you find me."

She blinked. The three youths must have found out about Brennan's past relationship with an elf, making a crippled beggar a target of their torment.

She didn't know how to react to that story, so she said nothing. Her husband and Alberti didn't look like they had any better idea, for they too were silent.

Well, this was a bit awkward

After a few moments Rex stepped forward and knelt next to the beggar, pressing a few gold coins—quite a bit of money, actually—into Brennan's hand.

But the beggar refused. Hrm?

"I'm sorry, but I can't take your coin, not from you, Mister Raglan."

Her eyes widened in surprise. They hadn't given their names.

Brennan smiled. "There are plenty of us across Agarest that remembered what you gave to us, despite the idiots here and there that forget or still hold to the old prejudices. The least I could do was give your boy there directions to the harbor." The beggar forced the coins back into Rex's hand.

She saw her husband nod before standing up.

"Very well," she heard Rex say. "Then you take of yourself then, then."

"You as well," answered Brennan.

* * *

"Interesting day," Rex said to Ellis.

"Ugh," his wife grunted, turning in bed to face him. "To be honest, I could do with more boring days."

"At least nothing worse happened."

"Silver linings," Ellis said wistfully.

He chuckled, scooting a little nearer to Ellis and drawing her closer.

After the... incident, they'd headed straight for the consular building to meet up with the others. They'd met Ryune, the current consul of Tlalocan and Beatrice's father, and several of governmental officials. They'd been treated to an extravagant dinner—well, extravagant compared to what he was used to, at least—and later turned in for the night early. The _Hildegard_ was leaving early in the morning for their trip to southern Fendias.

He was looking forward to that. He'd never seen his grandmother's home. And there was a chance he might be able to meet his maternal great-grandfather.

But in the meanwhile he had to get some sleep in the quite comfortable beds they had in the consular residence. Well, to be honest, anything that wasn't one of the _Hildegard_'s cots was comfortable. _Even_ if their small size meant he was squeezed up against Ellis all night.

Speaking of Ellis...

"Are you all right, though?" he asked. "About earlier, I mean."

His wife moved her head to rest it on his shoulder. "Not the worst I've heard or experienced. It just makes me sad that despite all that's been done for this world you can still run into those attitudes still."

He was expecting more, but Ellis said nothing. He regarded his wife through the darkness, barely illuminated by the moonlight filtering in through the windows. He could see that her eyes were open. She looked deep in thought.

There were times that he forgot how old Ellis was. Part of it was the familiarity of being married to her. They'd been together long enough that sometimes he forgot this high elf woman had raised three generations of his ancestors.

And that meant he also sometimes forgot how much life Ellis had lived.

What those punks had said to his wife had made him... very angry. It was was one of his qualities as a person that he had to work on, perhaps. But it wasn't until later, after dinner, that he had actually thought how those hurtful words might have affected Ellis.

Ellis was a strong woman, no doubt about that. But he knew the story of his his wife had met with his ancestor Leonhardt. He knew elves—especially high elves—faced all manners of bigotry across the continents for gods new why. He knew that had to weigh heavily on Ellis' mind.

Still, Ellis never seemed to let that bother her. He wondered, sometimes, how much it was her simply not carrying—who would take the opinions of a bigot seriously—and how much was Ellis putting on an act for his sake.

Or perhaps it was a mix of both. A woman who knew what some of the worse parts of the world were like, and a wife who didn't want to alarm her husband.

Without really considering it he propped himself up on an elbow and gave Ellis a soft kiss on her forehead.

"Hmm?" he heard Ellis say. "That seemed out of the blue."

He shrugged, even though he was sure Ellis couldn't see the gesture in the dark. He had considerably better night vision than she did. Another benefit of his diverse heritage.

"Maybe," he said. "Just thinking about this afternoon, which led to me thinking how lucky I am to have you. Stuff like that."

Ellis gave a small laugh. "It sounds like you're just trying to distract me."

He chuckled. "Oh, I don't know. I don't think you're the type of woman who'd _need_ that from me. And even if you did, why not?"

Traditional wisdom—or simply traditional tradition—held that the man should be the main pillar of strength in a marriage, supporting the wife, while the woman contributed her feminine approval. Maybe it was like that with other couples. He just knew that he relied heavily on Ellis' own quiet strength, maybe even more so than his wife relied on his.

But there were the times he was glad to be the main pillar. His wife was worth it.

His wife didn't say anything. He could just barely make out Ellis peering at him in the darkness.

Then Ellis leaned over and gave him a soft kiss of her own. "I suppose you're not the only lucky one," his wife said affectionately.


End file.
